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Book A __ 

Copyright W 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



THE 

Sunday-School Teacher 



AND THE 



Program of Jesus 



_ 



llllllillllllllMllllllllllllllllllllllllllllii: 



BY 

GEORGE H. TRULL 

AND 

JAY S. STOWELL 




PHILADELPHIA 

THE WESTMINSTER PRESS 

1915 



n&k 



Copyright, 1915 
By George H. Trull and Jay S. Stowell 




e>. xro 



MAY 21 1915 



CI.A398919 
^0/ 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

Foreword 5 

I. The Sunday-School Teacher and the Kingdom 9 

II. The Sunday-School Teacher and the World-Wide 

Outlook of the Bible 33 

III. The Sunday-School Teacher and the Homeland 57 

IV. The Sunday-School Teacher and the Nations 79 

V. The Sunday-School Teacher and Kingdom Invest- 
ments Ill 

VI. The Sunday School Organized for Kingdom Pro- 
motion 137 



FOREWORD 

The following pages have been prepared both 
for reading and study by Sunday-school teachers 
and officers. It is hoped that the suggested top- 
ics for discussion and the bibliographies appended 
to the chapters will render the book useful in 
teacher-training groups. 

The necessity and value of teacher training is 
now recognized. One part of the teacher's train- 
ing needs greater emphasis. This the authors 
have attempted to supply. It is their hope that 
many Sunday-school teachers in reading this book 
will gain a new conception of the teacher's respon- 
sibility, and will see more clearly than before the 
relation of their work to the supreme task of the 
Christian Church. 

The authors have collaborated in the entire 
work. 

George H. Trull, 
Jay S. Stowell. 

New York City, April 9, 1915. 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 
AND THE KINGDOM 



CHAPTER I 

THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER AND 
THE KINGDOM 

Sunday school was over for the day and the su- 
perintendent was alone. For twenty years he had 
been superintendent of this school. He was proud 
of that fact and he was proud of the school. The 
building was well equipped; the average attend- 
ance was good ; the finances were in a satisfactory 
condition. Of late, however, certain ideas had 
begun to trouble him. 

He had seen scores of boys and girls enter the 
lower grades of his Sunday school. He was also 
aware that the total enrollment of the school had 
not changed materially for the past fifteen years. 
For practically every child who had entered the 
lower grades an older pupil had left the school. 
All of these pupils he had known personally. 
Now they were farmers, grocerymen, carpenters, 
plumbers, clerks, teachers, doctors, lawyers. 
Many of them had homes of their own. Most of 
these former pupils were considered " respect- 
able " citizens. About twenty per cent of them 
were church members. A small fraction of this 
twenty per cent were active church workers. One 
member of the school had joined the Student Vol- 
unteer Band in college and later had gone as a 

9 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

missionary to China, Two or three others had un- 
dertaken as their life work some form of religious 
or social service in America. A few made regu- 
lar contributions to the missionary cause. 

In the meantime the Sunday school had lost 
neither in numbers nor in prestige. Gradually, 
however, the conviction had been growing upon 
the superintendent that the Sunday school was not 
an end in itself; that it existed for a purpose. 
Of course he had always known that fact, but it 
had never seemed to grip him before. After all, 
what was the purpose of the Sunday school? Was 
his school accomplishing its correct purpose? 
Had he and his associates ever clearly formulated 
that purpose? Surely the Sunday school existed 
to lead the pupils to Christ and to develop them 
in the Christian life. But, what is a Christian, if 
not a disciple of Jesus Christ? And what is a 
disciple? Jesus had explained this himself. His 
disciples are those who have chosen to follow him 
only, and to work with him in making the "king- 
dom" a reality. Only a fraction of this superin- 
tendent's pupils were eagerly and anxiously con- 
cerned either with the extension of the kingdom 
to new communities or with its realization in their 
own communities. Most of them were selfishly 
seeking pleasure, position, or money. During all 
these years, then, his Sunday school had been fail- 
ing to accomplish its true purpose with a very 
large proportion of its pupils. Surely some of 

10 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

this apparent failure was due to causes beyond 
the superintendent's control and that of his as- 
sociates. And yet some of it might be due to 
causes of which he was master. It was this 
thought which troubled him as he buttoned his 
coat and started on his homeward walk. 

The Aim of the Sunday School. — This superin- 
tendent's state of mind was a hopeful indication. 
He had begun to think definitely about the aim of 
the Sunday school. He had decided that, ulti- 
mately, the Sunday school must be tested by the 
proportion of its pupils who become Christian and 
by the quality of the Christianity which their lives 
exemplify. A law school exists to produce law- 
yers; a medical school to produce doctors. A 
Christian Sunday school exists to produce efficient 
Christians. Speaking of the Sunday school, Pro- 
fessor Walter S. Athearn says, "The functions of 
the church school are (a) to develop intelligent and 
efficient Christian lives consecrated to the exten- 
sion of God's kingdom on earth, and (b) to train 
efficient leaders for all phases of church work." 1 

Sunday-School Profit and Loss. — A large pro- 
portion of Sunday-school pupils leave the Sunday 
school without accepting Christ as their Saviour 
and Master. Others become professing Christians 
of such inferior quality and such lackadaisical 

^'The Church School," (Page 1) by Walter S. Athearn, The 
Pilgrim Press. 

11 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

spirit that their value to the work of the kingdom 
is slight. It is said that only fifteen per cent of 
Sunday-school pupils ever become church mem- 
bers. 2 If the Sunday school is judged by the total 
number of its members who have become earnest, 
capable Christians, it may be considered a remark- 
able success. If it is judged by the number of per- 
sons who have at some time been its members and 
then have failed to become a vital part of the or- 
ganized Christian Church, the Sunday school has 
failed most lamentably. Probably neither of these 
judgments is quite correct. The Sunday school 
has been only one of many factors in the lives of 
those of its members who have become efficient 
Christians, and it has played a much smaller part 
in the lives of those who have failed to become 
Christians. It, therefore, deserves neither all the 
credit nor all the blame which is sometimes at- 
tributed to it, 

A Christian Goal Essential. — Because the Sun- 
day school is a school, the developing needs of the 
pupil must determine the organizing principles 
of the work. Because the Sunday school is Chris- 
tian, however, it is assumed in advance that the 
pupil will find his richest life by adopting the 
Christian way of life. This is not discovered 
by allowing all traits of the pupil to develop 

2 "Church Efficiency/' (Pages 14 and 40) by D. C. Tremaine, 
F. II. Eevell Company. 

12 



AND THE PROGRAM OF- JESUS 

and then selecting for culture those which seem 
most desirable in each particular case. On the 
contrary Christian society has already deter- 
mined that Christian standards are desirable for 
itself and for the individual. A deliberate at- 
tempt is made to make the individual conform to 
these standards. The methods by which it is 
sought to attain the goal of a Christian Sunday 
school may be determined largely by the char- 
acteristics of the child at the various stages of 
his development, but the goal itself will depend 
upon the educators f interpretation of Chris- 
tianity. 

A Definition of Christianity. — To many the Bi- 
ble is a message of personal salvation; the 
Church is the ark of that salvation and the su- 
preme experience of their own religious life is the 
joy of realizing that they are saved. To others 
Christianity is primarily a set of rules encourag- 
ing certain virtues and discouraging certain vices. 
It is clear, however, that this is not all of Chris- 
tianity. If we may judge by the words and ex- 
ample of its founder, Christianity is a great 
propaganda. It cannot be otherwise. The es- 
sence of Christianity is the sharing of one's best 
with others. But Christianity itself is always the 
best which the Christian has. The Christian re- 
ligion contains within itself, therefore, the forces 
which continually tend to break bounds and over- 

13 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

flow into new territory. Christianity must ex- 
press itself, or it is not Christanity. So long as 
there are persons who are not having a fair 
chance at Christian opportunities and blessings, 
the highest form of Christianity's expression will 
be the sharing of the Christian life in all its full- 
ness with others. 

Missionary Work. — All of this outreach of the 
Church to new communities and to unreached 
groups and individuals in older communities may 
be termed missionary, as contrasted with those 
activities carried on in well-established churches, 
which look primarily toward the care, culture and 
training of church members, of children born into 
the Church and of others closely associated with 
an organized Christian society. The fact that 
some of this work is done under the direction of 
mission Boards, and that some of it is not so done, 
does not change the character of the work. It is 
coming to be generally recognized that one of the 
most important tasks of general missionary 
agencies, home and foreign, is to induce local 
agencies to assume responsibility for larger areas 
and a greater variety of needs in the local 
parish. 

Jesus' Program. — Jesus' program for his dis- 
ciples began with the task just at hand, but it 
clearly included the whole world. He called his 
followers that they might become "fishers of 

14 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

men. ' ' 3 He trained them that they might be the 
heralds of his message. He started a propaganda 
which was to be extended by his followers "into 
all the world. ' ' 4 The central theme of his teach- 
ing was this world-wide "kingdom," 5 of which he 
dreamed. The early disciples "went about 
preaching the word. " 6 To be a Christian in the 
early Church was to be an extender of the king- 
dom. Since those early days Christianity has 
spread to many lands. There are still many 
places and some vast areas, however, where Chris- 
tianity is practically unknown. Even in those 
lands which for convenience are called "Chris- 
tian" the kingdom is far from a reality. Many 
in such lands, even yet, are denied Christian privi- 
leges. We may well believe that the chief con- 
cern of Jesus is still in the extension of the king- 
dom to the unreached, and its complete realization 
in communities where a beginning has been made. 
A reliable and worthy follower of Jesus will share 
this concern of the great Leader. 

The Sunday-School Output. — Intelligent, influ- 
ential and financially successful adults who are 
satisfied with themselves if they attend church 
regularly or occasionally and support in some 
small way the local church work are not, then, an 

3 Matt. 4 r 19. 

4 Mark 16 : 15. 

5 Matt. 4:17. 

6 Acts 8:4.' 

15 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

entirely satisfactory product for a Christian 
Sunday school. Sunday-school teachers may not 
be content when their pupils become successful 
lawyers, doctors and business men, who are self- 
centered and have little or no interest in investing 
life or money in the work of the kingdom. 

Three Kinds of Workers. — In general, pro- 
gress in kingdom extension is made possible by 
Christian workers who devote their entire time 
to the work; by volunteer lay workers who are 
able to give a portion of their time to it and by 
that other large group of Christians who through 
study, prayer and contributions supply much of 
the moral support, spiritual energy and financial 
backing which are necessary for carrying on the 
work. These three groups are not mutually ex- 
clusive. It would seem that every Christian 
should be in one or more of them, each of which 
sadly needs recruits. The fields are still " white 
already unto harvest." 7 Many communities in 
America are entirely without religious opportuni- 
ties because honest and capable Christian young 
men have become self-seeking business men when 
they ought to have given their lives to the work 
of the kingdom, or, entering the business world, 
have failed to improve their opportunities for lay 
evangelism and other forms of lay service. Im- 
migrants come to this country and leave without 

7 John 4 : 35. 

16 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

coming in touch with Protestant Christianity, be- 
cause some Sunday-school pupils never become 
really concerned about the extension of the king- 
dom. Difficult social problems are unsolved be- 
cause professing Christians, taught in Christian 
Sunday schools, are living lives of selfish, per- 
sonal gratification instead of lives of service. The 
need on the foreign field is overwhelming and the 
Church is not supplying the men, the money, or 
the prayer adequate to meet it. 

The Pupil and Service. — Surely there must be 
some relation between these facts and the task of 
a teacher in a Christian Sunday school. The edu- 
cational department of the Christian Church 
should evidently be training pupils who will meet 
the world's need. It is not sufficient that pupils 
shall learn lessons, important as the lessons are. 
Pupils must be trained to render efficient service. 
Only in the field of service can a pupil find his 
highest development. Only through lives of serv- 
ice can the purposes of a Christian society be car- 
ried out. On the face of it, the challenge of Jesus 
to his disciples seems to be contrary to educa- 
tional principles. How can the highest develop- 
ment of the pupil be secured, when the great Mas- 
ter of the school insists that his followers shall 
lose themselves in sacrificial service? Yet, 
strange to say, this is the path of self-realization. 
"For whosoever would save his life shall lose it; 

17 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

and whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and 
the gospel's shall save it." 8 The interests and 
needs of the pupil are, thus, closely interwoven 
with those of the world to which he is to give him- 
self in service. They are so interrelated that one 
cannot be determined without relation to the 
other. 

The Modern Missionary Enterprise. — When the 
first Sunday school was organized, the modern 
missionary enterprise of the Church, which has 
since assumed such vast proportions, had not 
been undertaken. It is not surprising, therefore, 
that the Sunday school assumed a form and 
adopted a type of organization in which instruc- 
tion concerning the missionary propaganda of 
the Church and training for participation in it 
had little or no part. Since the first Sunday 
school was organized some very important devel- 
opments have occurred. The missionary enter- 
prise of the Church has grown from a neglected 
element until it has become perhaps the largest 
single factor in organized Christian work. As the 
plan of Jesus has been worked out new meaning 
has been seen in his teachings. The truth of the 
words, i i If any man willeth to do his will, he shall 
know of the teaching" 9 has thus been demon- 
strated. Especially has Jesus' teaching concern- 

8 Mark 8 : 35. 

9 John 7 : 17. 

18 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

ing the "kingdom" taken on new significance. 
The Church has begun to glow with a new passion. 
It is not surprising, then, that Christian teachers 
should feel that there is now presented a large 
opportunity for the expression of the Christian 
motive and a great body of information with which 
Sunday-school pupils should become familiar. To- 
ward these the attention of pupils should be di- 
rected, if they are to understand the purpose of 
Jesus and identify themselves with it. 

Missions and the Sunday School. — Do missions 
belong in a Christian Sunday school? One may 
as well ask, "Do trees belong in the forest or 
waters in the sea?" Of course missions belong 
in the Sunday school. But why! Is it because 
missions need the Sunday school, or because the 
Sunday school needs missions'? It is easy to see 
what the Sunday school has done for the mis- 
sionary enterprise. It has furnished the volun- 
teers, the contributors, the intercessors, the 
personal workers, the local evangelists. Mis- 
sions cannot get along without the Sunday school. 
Can the Sunday school get along without mis- 
sions? 

The Sunday school would be as handicapped 
without opportunity for missionary expression as 
a chemistry teacher without a laboratory or a 
farmer without a farm. "What the laboratory is 
to the teacher and the farm to the farmer, the mis-. 

19 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHEK 

sionary enterprise is to the Sunday school. It is 
in the missionary expression more completely 
than anywhere else that the pupil learns Chris- 
tianity by living it. 

It is true that a pupil may be trained in polite- 
ness, honesty, temperance and similar virtues 
without attempting to share with others his 
choicest blessing, namely, Christianity. These 
qualities are, however, relatively negative and 
passive. The pupil needs some big task, some 
more adequate self-expression, to make the fiber 
of his moral and religious being strong. 

Character as a By-Product. — The well-rounded 
character which is desired in Sunday-school pu- 
pils is not to be attained most readily by center- 
ing the attention of the pupil upon himself. This 
character results when the individual is led to give 
himself in unselfish service to a great Christian 
task. 

Opportunity for Character Development. — 
Where is a more worthy task to be found than 
that of extending the blessings of Christianity to 
others? There are other tasks, but none more 
thoroughly Christian and none in which the pu- 
pil may express his life more unreservedly. 
There is more involved than the mere finding of 
an opportunity for the pupil to express some- 
thing which he already possesses. It concerns 

20 



AND THE PKOGRAM OF JESUS 

also the acquisition of that toward which he and 
his teacher aspire. Christianity is more than an 
intellectual assent to certain propositions and an 
adjustment of the life to a set of rules. It is a 
personal relationship. It is doubtful whether one 
may enter into the rare relationship with God 
and man which should be the experience of the 
Christian, except as he attempts to share his 
Christianity with another. The missionary ex- 
pression is, then, not only the proof that a pupil 
is Christian, but also a means by which Christian 
character is developed. The task of the Sunday- 
school teacher is then, in large part, that of re- 
lating, not merely the intellect, but the life of the 
pupil to the missionary task of the Church. As a 
formally commissioned missionary, as a volunteer 
worker, or as a loyal promoter and supporter of 
the missionary enterprise, the Sunday-school pu- 
pil may come into a Christian experience which 
cannot otherwise be assured, and without which 
his Christian development will be incomplete. 

The Sterner Moral Virtues. — Many have de- 
plored the fact that apart from war there is little 
opportunity to develop the sterner moral virtues. 
It has been suggested that in the missionary en- 
terprise the Church has a moral equivalent for 
war; a task which calls out the best in the way 
of courage, perseverance, endurance and heroism. 
The Sunday-school teacher who, through instruc- 

21 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

tion, wishes to build up a high ideal of personal 
bravery and moral courage need not turn to mili- 
tary heroes. A finer example of heroism cannot 
be found than the remarkable life of John Wil- 
liams, the hero of Polynesia, who again and 
again faced a most cruel death and finally rounded 
out his long devoted service by suffering martyr- 
dom at the hands of savages to whom he was fear- 
lessly bringing the message of peace. No boy 
can come in touch with the life of Adoniram Jud- 
son, and no girl can read the life of Mrs. Judson 
without coming under the spell of a heroism which 
is far finer than is to be found in the annals of 
battle. At a time when few believed in the for- 
eign mission enterprise, these young people went 
into a far country where no welcome awaited 
them; endured hardships, perils, imprisonments 
and sufferings untold. Through it all, however, 
they remained true and their courage was un- 
daunted. The lives of Mr. and Mrs. Marcus 
Whitman and their marytyrdom at the hands of 
the Indians they had come to serve, the life of 
Sheldon Jackson, the heroic statesman and mis- 
sionary of the Great West and of Alaska; these 
and many other lives contain educational mate- 
rial of a high order for promoting character de- 
velopment. The hearts of boys and girls will beat 
faster and ideals will be formed which they will 
never quite lose, as they come to know these 
stories of true heroism. 

22 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

A Present Challenge. — Nor need the teacher 
depend wholly upon illustrations of heroism in the 
past. There is still demand for the heroic. The 
day of martyrdom is not yet past in the mission- 
ary enterprise. Few may be called upon to suffer 
violent deaths, but many are needed to live lives 
of sacrificial service. The group of those who go 
to the mission field may remain comparatively 
small. Many, however, will honestly face the call 
with a readiness to "go," who will be providen- 
tially prevented. These will find their spiritual 
life quickened and their Christian efficiency in- 
creased, because of their experience in facing this 
challenge. 

An Ideal of Honesty and Fidelity. — There are 
many other character qualities, the development 
of which will be aided by the use of -missionary 
material and by the missionary appeal. If the 
teacher wishes to build up an ideal of honesty, in- 
tegrity and fidelity, better material will hardly 
be found than in the life of David Livingstone. 
When worn out and sick, he reached the west 
coast of Africa with his small band of native fol- 
lowers, he must have been sorely tempted to take 
the boat which he found about to sail for England. 
He had made his long and painfully laborious 
journey that he might open a way into the heart 
of Africa and break up the slave trade which he 
hated. His physical condition was such as to seem 

23 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

to amply justify careful attention to his own wel- 
fare. The fact that he had given his word to his 
dark-skinned friends made him turn resolutely to 
the return journey, however. The perils of swamp 
and forest were of little significance as compared 
with keeping his word given to these ignorant men 
of the wilderness. This is but one illustration of 
the spirit of fidelity which characterized his entire 
life. To know such a man presents the challenge 
of noble living to any Sunday-school pupil. 

A Breadth of Sympathy. — Another quality which 
is desired in Sunday-school pupils is breadth of 
sympathy. This quality like others is developed 
through exercise. By means of the newspaper and 
the public school the pupil's fund of knowledge 
rapidly increases. Whether or not this broader 
outlook upon life will be tempered with Christian 
sympathy, will depend largely upon the ideas 
which the pupil gains and the ideals which are held 
before him in the Sunday school. Some one has 
said that a man will be more concerned about the 
loss of one half inch of his little finger than to 
know that ten thousand people in a region far 
away are dying of starvation. Such undeveloped 
sympathy is a confession of human weakness and 
not a sign of Christian strength. By means of 
careful missionary instruction and abundant op- 
portunity for the expression of sympathy, Sun- 
day-school teachers may help develop in their 

24 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

pupils a broad Christian sympathy. To study the 
Mountaineer, the Negro, the Chinese, or the Hot- 
tentot from the missionary point of view will 
make possible the development of qualities of 
character in the pupil which are not often culti- 
vated by the discussion of the same topics in the 
history or geography classes of the public school. 

Place of Imagination. — In developing the sym- 
pathetic quality it is necessary that the imagina- 
tion shall lead the individual to share to some ex- 
tent the experience of another. This ability to 
enter somewhat into the experience of others is 
not dependent upon the proximity of the indi- 
viduals. The pupil who can share the experiences 
of another at the distance of a few miles, can with 
little difficulty be made to feel with the needs of 
others at much greater distances. The funda- 
mental human experiences are common to hu- 
manity, and a breadth of sympathy which will to 
some extent identify the pupil with the entire 
world may be developed before pupils leave the 
Sunday school, through skillful missionary in- 
struction and training. A pupil so developed has 
one of the essential qualities of an efficient mem- 
ber of Christian society. 

Missions Interpreting the Bible. — Again, the mis- 
sionary enterprise aids the Sunday-school teacher 
in interpreting the Bible lessons. The funda- 

25 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

mental teachings of Jesus have taken on new 
meaning in the light of a century of aggressive 
modern missionary effort. The conception of 
what it means to become a Christian has been 
modified as experience in winning individuals to 
Christianity has accumulated. The essentials and 
the non-essentials of the Christian faith have 
also appeared in their true light as Christianity 
has come into contact with other religions. The 
Christian doctrine of salvation has been better 
understood as it has been seen side by side with 
other ideas of salvation. There is hardly an im- 
portant Christian conception, the meaning of 
which has not been modified or clarified by the 
missionary enterprise. Both teacher and pupil 
will find that knowledge of and contact with mis- 
sions is essential for an intelligent interpreta- 
tion of many of the Bible lessons in the Sunday 
school. 

Work of Teacher Incomplete Without Mis- 
sions. — Thus, knowledge of and contact with the 
missionary enterprise of the Church supplies that 
which broadens the pupil's intellect, develops 
the Christian emotions and the will, and helps to 
strengthen both the sterner and the finer virtues 
which should characterize one who has had a com- 
plete course in a Christian Sunday school. In ad- 
dition, missionary education furnishes the train- 
ing whereby Sunday-school pupils may become 

26 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

efficient Christians, who will promote the aims of 
the Christian society of which they form a part. 
Without missionary instruction and training in 
the Sunday-school class, the teacher may not hope 
to discharge his full responsibility for the re- 
ligious education of his pupils. 



27 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 



FOR DISCUSSION 

1. When may a Sunday school be considered successful? 

2. Is your Sunday school a successful school? 

3. What results can you point to as proof of this? 

4. What is the chief purpose of the Christian Church? 

5. In what way is the Sunday school related to the accom- 

plishment of the Christian purpose in the world? 

6. What is the relation between instruction and training in 

education ? 

7. To what extent is it possible for a Sunday-school teacher 

to influence a pupil's life? 

8. How would you define missionary education? 

9. What would be your attitude in discussing whether mis- 

sionary education is an optional phase of religious edu- 
cation? Give reasons in support of your position. 

10. What should be the aim of missionary education in the 

Sunday school? 

11. What missionary work should this school be doing in its 

own community? 

12. How may this school develop a vital interest on the part 

of its pupils in the work done through its denomina- 
tional mission Boards? 



28 



AND THE PROGRAM OF. JESUS 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Church Efficiency. By D. C. Tremaine. Fleming* H. Revell 
Company. Pp. 124; cloth, 50 cents. 
A study of the organization and activities of the local 
church from the standpoint of business efficiency. 

Education in Religion and Morals. By George Albert Coe. 
Fleming H. Revell Company. Pp. 434; cloth, $1.35. 
A presentation of the theory of religious education and a 
discussion of various religious educational agencies includ- 
ing the Sunday school. 

Efficiency in the Sunday School. By Henry F. Cope. 
George H. Doran Company. Pp. 253; cloth, $1.00. 
An application of efficiency standards to Sunday-school 
problems. 

Graded Social Service in the Sunday School. By W. Nor- 
man Hutchins. University of Chicago Press. Pp. 135; 
cloth, 75 cents. 
A statement of the principles underlying social service 
and a wealth of methods and concrete suggestions growing 
out of practical experiences. 

The Church School. By Walter S. Athearn. The Pilgrim 
Press (1914). Pp. 309; cloth, $1.00. 
A clear statement of the methods and aims of religious 
education and a discussion of the various departments of 
the Sunday school. 

The Evolution of the Sunday School. By Henry F. Cope. 
The Pilgrim Press. Pp. 240; cloth, 75 cents. 
A most satisfactory brief history of the development of 
the Sunday school. 



29 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER AND 

THE WORLD-WIDE OUTLOOK 

OF THE BIBLE 



CHAPTER II 

THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER AND THE 
WORLD-WIDE OUTLOOK OF THE BIBLE 

The same landscape is regarded differently by 
different persons. To one it is "beauty," to an- 
other it is "home," to another it has possibilities 
for "financial return." The observer sees only 
those aspects which his experience and training 
have taught him to appreciate. Thus it is with the 
Bible. In it one Sunday-school teacher perceives 
only a collection of documents of historical in- 
terest; another finds a message of personal sal- 
vation; still another recognizes the great charter 
and working program of the Christian Church 
for the extension of the kingdom of God. 

Correct Conception of New Testament Neces- 
sary. — Conceptions of the nature of the Christian 
religion are derived largely from the New Testa- 
ment writings. It is important, therefore, that 
Sunday-school teachers discern the nature of the 
material which they handle so freely in their 
classes. A certain Sunday-school teacher when 
asked, "Do you have missionary instruction in 
your Sunday school?" replied, "No." This 
teacher was using the book of The Acts as a basis 
for her lesson material. She was discussing with 

33 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

her class the life of Paul, the greatest Christian 
missionary. From Sunday to Sunday his journey- 
ings were traced on the map. The work was prov- 
ing most interesting and profitable. In spite of 
this fact, she did not appreciate the missionary 
character of the material with which she was deal- 
ing. If the full significance of the Bible material 
is grasped, one cannot escape the teaching of mis- 
sions in the Sunday school. 

New Testament Authorship. — There is reason 
to believe that every one of the twenty-seven 
books in the New Testament was written by a 
missionary. Probably more than half of them 
were written by missionaries while engaged in 
missionary service. Thirteen of these books are 
ascribed to Paul. They grew out of his life as 
a missionary. They were occasioned by situ- 
ations on the mission field. Most of them were 
addressed to mission churches or to individuals 
engaged in mission work. The book of The Acts 
is devoted largely to an account of PauPs life and 
work. Thus fourteen of the twenty-seven books 
present chiefly the work and ideas of one mission- 
ary. The general epistles and Eevelation were 
written to meet certain situations in mission 
churches. It is hardly necessary to analyze the 
authorship of the New Testament further in or- 
der to suggest that it is peculiarly a product of a 
missionary environment. The epistles are in pur- 

34 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

pose and authorship missionary, while the Gospels 
present the Magna Charta of the missionary 
propaganda, out of which all the books of the New 
Testament grew. 

The Kingdom. — It is possible to grant the his- 
torical validity of these statements, however, 
without fully appreciating their significance. The 
study of the missionary occasion and authorship 
of the New Testament should lead to the consid- 
eration of some of its most significant teachings. 
One of the most frequently used figures of speech 
of the New Testament is that of the "kingdom." 
It appears ninety-five times in the first three Gos- 
pels. It was the first subject of Jesus' preach- 
ing, "From that time began Jesus to preach, and 
to say, Repent ye; for the kingdom of heaven is 
at hand." 10 It was the first petition and the cen- 
tral theme in the prayer which he taught his dis- 
ciples, "Thy kingdom come." 11 Most of Jesus' 
parables unfold this conception. He spoke of the 
kingdom as the "grain of mustard seed, . . . which 
indeed is less than all seeds," 12 but finally be- 
comes a great tree; as "leaven" working "till 
it all was leavened"; 13 as the "pearl of great 
price" 14 for which a man wisely sold "all that 



10 Matt. 4 : 17. 

11 Matt. 6 : 10. 

12 Matt. 13 : 31, 32. 

13 Matt. 13 : 33. 

14 Matt. 13 : 46. 

35 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

he hath"; as "treasure hidden in the field." 15 
His most impressive language, his most carefully 
selected comparisons were used to describe the 
kingdom. So much was involved in this conception 
that it seemed necessary for Jesus to devote much 
of his teaching to it in order to make sure that it 
should not be misunderstood. The group which he 
had gathered about himself did not comprise the 
kingdom. "Other sheep I have, which are not of 
this fold." 16 "The field is the world." 17 The 
members of the group were messengers of the king- 
dom, they were its agents and they were intrusted 
with the responsibility of extending its borders. 
They proclaimed "the gospel of the kingdom." 
The kingdom, however, was something far greater 
than any group of men, any nation or any par- 
ticular type of organization. It had for its poten- 
tial limits only the limits of humanity. The ex- 
tension of the kingdom involved much more than 
the preaching of a gospel of personal salvation 
for a future world. To be sure it included this, 
but it also involved the establishment of the king- 
dom here and now. Jesus might have defined the 
kingdom as the sway or rule of God. For the 
early accomplishment of this end his disciples 
were to labor. One outstanding impression made 
by Jesus' teaching is that the kingdom is a pos- 



15 Matt. 13 : 44. 

16 John 10 : 16. 

17 Matt. 13 : 38. 

36 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

sibility on earth. ' ' Thy kingdom come. Thy will 
be done, as in heaven, so on earth," 18 was not a 
carelessly formulated prayer. "The kingdom of 
God cometh not with observation" for lo, it "is 
within you. " 19 It was only by living in the king- 
dom here that his followers could become quali- 
fied for enjoying its future manifestation. This 
is brought out clearly in the parable of the tal- 
ents. 20 There are many passages which seem to 
indicate that the kingdom is also a future inherit- 
ance. It doubtless had both present and future 
aspects in Jesus' thought. The responsibility of 
his followers, however, related primarily to mak- 
ing the kingdom a reality in this world. Such ef- 
fort made the best possible preparation for the 
kingdom of the future. 

The Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of 
Man. — Parallel with Jesus' conception of the 
kingdom, were his two closely related ideas of the 
Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. 
These were not entirely new conceptions, yet they 
were given new meaning by Jesus. The parable 
of the Prodigal Son makes vital a conception of 
God which had been largely overlooked in the 
teachings of the Old Testament prophets. A 
Father God cannot be content until everything 
possible has been done to bring every child into 

18 Matt. 6 : 10. 

19 Luke 17 : 20, 21. 

20 Matt. 25 : 14-30. 

37 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

a filial relationship with himself, and no loyal 
child of such a God can be quite happy until every 
lost brother within his reach has heard the good 
news of the Father's undying love. Thus the 
world-wide outreach of Jesus' teaching seems to 
be all-pervasive. 

Jesus Training His Workers. — Jesus' ideal of 
life was missionary. His high regard for John 
the Baptist is one indication of this. John the 
Baptist was in every sense a missionary. Of him 
Jesus said, " Among them that are born of 
women there hath not arisen a greater than John 
the Baptist. ' ' 21 His dealings with his disciples 
provide a similar illustration. His one purpose 
for his disciples was that they should become mis- 
sionaries. So far as we know all of them except 
Judas became missionaries. In fact they had 
been called to become missionaries. "Come ye 
after me, and I will make you fishers of men." 22 
It was no selfish motive to which Jesus appealed. 
Persons were to become his disciples that they 
might win others. This was Jesus' first challenge 
to those he called to discipleship. His few years of 
companionship with them were devoted largely 
to teaching and training designed to fit them for 
missionary service. In the tenth chapter of 
Matthew we have a detailed account of one of the 



21 Matt. 11 : 11. 

22 Matt. 4 : 19. 

38 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

occasions on which he sent his disciples out on 
missionary trips. Evidently he was training them 
for future efficiency in similar work. He gives 
elaborate detailed instructions as to how they are 
to act and as to what they may reasonably expect 
to encounter by way of opposition, persecution 
and rewards. It seems likely that this was only 
one of many similar commissions. In Luke 9 : 10 
and Mark 6 : 30, we are told of the return of the 
disciples from such a trip. Jesus took them apart 
into a place of quiet, yi order to talk over with 
them the results of their work and point out les- 
sons for the future. Jesus' last request to his 
disciples related to the extension of the kingdom 
"unto all the nations, beginning from Jerusa- 
lem." 23 Thus Jesus' intercourse with the Twelve 
constantly revealed his missionary outlook and 
passion. 

Paul. — Next to Jesus, Paul is perhaps the most 
striking character of the New Testament. He 
has been a commanding figure throughout the his- 
tory of the Christian Church. From him we have 
drawn our lessons of faith, courage, rejoicing and 
Christian perseverance, and from his teachings 
we have taken religious conceptions and theo- 
logical doctrines. It is notable, therefore, that 
Paul's particular interpretation of Christian 
truth grew out of concrete experiences on the mis- 

23 Luke 24 : 47. 

39 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

sion field. The problems which confronted him 
are the problems which confront missionaries to- 
day. He went to a people already committed to 
certain religions ideas and practices. He found 
himself nnder the necessity of inculcating new 
standards of morality and of proclaiming truths 
which were to change existing ideas. Out of this 
concrete missionary situation came much of our 
theology. Many of the rules of practice which 
found their warrant in Paul's teaching were de- 
signed by him to meet particular situations in 
new churches and among new converts. The mis- 
sionary passion literally consumed his life. It 
was always the "parts beyond," 24 where he 
desired "to preach the gospel." Asia might 
serve as a starting place for his labors, but he 
must needs press on into Macedonia, 25 Achaia, 26 
Italy 2T and Spain. 28 . Into how many other places 
Paul may have gone we do not know. We do 
know that to the limit of his ability he endeavored 
to carry the gospel which had saved him from 
"the body of this death," 20 to those who had 
heard it not. His biographer leaves him at work 
in the heart of the great pagan Roman Empire. 30 

24 II Cor. 10 : 16. 

25 Acts 16 : 9, 10. 

26 Acts 18 : 27; I Cor. 16 : 15; II Cor. 11 : 10. 

27 Acts 27.: 1; Eom. 1 : 15. 

28 Rom. 15 : 24. 

29 Rom. 7 : 24. 

30 Acts 28 : 30, 31. 

40 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

A Dispute in the Early Church. — Despite the 
missionary teaching and example of Jesus and 
Paul, it should not be imagined that the early 
Church accepted the broad missionary program 
of Jesus without a protest. The Jewish Chris- 
tian of apostolic days had too lately come out of 
the narrow conservatism of Judaism. This pro- 
test assumed such proportions that a formal 
Council was held at Jerusalem 31 to determine 
whether it was necessary for Gentiles to become 
Jews before becoming Christians. It was the 
speech of Peter who had previously defended his 
own practice of preaching to the Gentiles, 32 which 
finally decided the question. The decision which 
was in the nature of a compromise did, however, 
settle once for all the question of the wider out- 
reach of the program of the Christian Church. 33 
All of the books of the New Testament were 
written after this question had been decided, and 
the missionary propaganda was accepted as an in- 
tegral part of the program of the Christian Church. 

USING THE MISSIONARY MATERIAL OF 

THE NEW TESTAMENT IN THE 

SUNDAY SCHOOL 

The problem therefore which confronts Sun- 
day-school teachers is that of developing skill 

31 Acts, ch. 15. 

32 Acts, ch. 11. 

33 Acts, 15 : 23-29. 

41 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

in the use of this New Testament material which 
is evidently so thoroughly missionary in its au- 
thorship, its occasion and its content. Let us ex- 
amine its content further with this in mind. 

Missionary Teachings of Jesus. — Much of Je- 
sus' teaching is so clearly missionary in char- 
acter that its application is obvious. The great 
commission, "Go ye therefore, and make disciples 
of all the nations, . . . and lo, I am with you al- 
ways, even unto the end of the world," 34 is such 
an example. In other cases the missionary teach- 
ing is not so direct. 

The missionary implications of some of the 
teachings of Jesus which at first do not seem to 
be particularly missionary may be emphasized. 
One example will illustrate: Jesus laid great 
emphasis upon the necessity and the desirability 
of sacrifice on the part of his followers. "He 
that loveth father or mother more than me is 
not worthy of me." 35 "No man, having put his 
hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the 
kingdom of God. " 36 If a man i ~ renounce th not all 
that he hath, he cannot be my disciple." 37 These 
and many other words of Jesus indicate his 
thought concerning sacrifice. It was not the ab- 
normal and exceptional thing, but it was the thing 

34 Matt. 28 : 19, 20. 

35 Matt. 10 : 37. 
38 Luke 9 : 62. 
37 Luke 14 : 33. 

42 



AND THE PROGRAM OP JESUS 

which he expected of all his disciples. In teach- 
ing these and similar passages in Sunday-school 
classes, there is afforded an opportunity to lay 
the foundations of a life of consecrated missionary 
activity. It has sometimes been felt that it is ask- 
ing too much of a beautiful young woman or of a 
brilliant young man, each of whom has spent years 
in preparation for life's work, to say "good-by " to 
friends and go to a distant land as a missionary, 
or to accept a home missionary salary when busi- 
ness opportunities offer. To become a mission- 
ary has seemed abnormal and the missionary has 
been considered in a certain sense "peculiar." 
In the sense that only a few can become mission- 
aries to distant parts, the missionary is different 
from others. It is not true, however, that those 
who stay at home are therefore relieved of the 
obligation of sacrificial service. Is it not clear 
that, if this important teaching of Jesus concern- 
ing sacrifice as a normal part of the Christian 
life is emphasized, a very great service to the pu- 
pil and the kingdom may be done? Instead of a 
few exceptional individuals who have caught the 
spirit of Christlike self-sacrifice, the kingdom 
needs a host of individuals who have made this 
spirit a normal part of their Christian life. The 
pupil must of necessity live such a life of self- 
sacrifice if he is to have a normal Christian de- 
velopment and attain unto the worth-while things 
of the Christian life. 

43 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

New Testament Biographies. — The missionary 
character of the life of Paul, Peter, John Mark, 
Philip, Timothy and of many other persons men- 
tioned in the New Testament, of whom we know 
less, may be emphasized. Pupils should realize 
that the early Church was completely permeated 
with the missionary passion and activity. They 
ought also to understand that throughout the ages 
the dominant characteristics of a loyal Christian 
have remained unchanged. 

The Acts and the Epistles of Paul. — The book 
of The Acts is filled with the finest missionary 
material. In teaching the book it is important 
that the pupils should realize that therein is re- 
corded the beginning of a program the consum- 
mation of which is still in the future, but the pro- 
motion of which is now in the hands of the Chris- 
tian Church. 

The epistles of Paul present still another type 
of opportunity to broaden the life of the pupil 
and relate it to the work of the kingdom. These 
epistles grew out of a missionary environment 
and were for the most part written to missionary 
churches or to Paul's helpers in missionary serv- 
ice. It is possible to trace parallels between con- 
ditions in Paul's time and those which exist to- 
day in such a way as to make more vivid the con- 
dition of the churches among which Paul worked, 
and also to promote interest in the Church on 

41 



AND THE PROGRAM OF- JESUS 

the mission field to-day. In the ninth chapter of 
Second Corinthians Paul takes up the question of 
giving as related to the Corinthian Church. In 
teaching this passage it will be appropriate to 
call attention to the emphasis upon self-support 
to-day, both in home mission and in foreign mis- 
sion churches. Many denominations will not 
grant aid to a home mission church until a thor- 
ough investigation has been made as to whether 
or not the church members are paying their fair 
proportion of the expense. On the foreign field 
great emphasis has been laid upon this matter 
of self-support, and members of native churches 
have given to a point of sacrifice almost unknown 
in our own country. The early Church needed 
the grace of giving, and the Church to-day needs 
to have similar habits encouraged, not alone for 
the amount which will thus be contributed, but 
equally as much for the effect upon the characters 
of the givers. 

In the second chapter of Philippians Paul ex- 
horts the church at Philippi to lowliness of mind, 
love and Christian unitv. These are the same 
graces which are so much needed in missionary 
work to-day. Comity and cooperation have de- 
veloped rapidly within the last few years both 
on the home and foreign mission field. The spirit 
of humility, love and unity is still needed on the 
mission field. Missionaries need denominational 
loyalty, but it is far more essential that they 

45 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

should be loyal to the kingdom and for the sake 
of the work be willing to cease sectarian strife and 
unite heart and hand in the common task of the 
Church. Likewise members and converts in mis- 
sion churches, particularly need the spirit of 
love, unity and humility if their example is to 
bear witness for Christ and the work is to 
progress. 

These are only a few of the ways in which the 
lesson material of the New Testament may be 
used to arouse boys and girls to lives of service 
and to connect their lives with the great mission- 
ary program of the Church. Is it not in propor- 
tion as the missionary character of the New 
Testament message is emphasized that its spirit 
will be correctly interpreted to Sunday-school pu- 
pils? Is it not also clear that Sunday-school pu- 
pils will be really Christian to the degree that 
the missionary idea and practice controls their 
lives? 

THE OLD TESTAMENT 

In turning to the Old Testament for the pur- 
pose of discovering its missionary teaching, one 
is not so immediately impressed with its mission- 
ary character as in the case of the New Testa- 
ment. The books did not grow out of a mission- 
ary propaganda. They were not addressed to mis- 
sion churches. Their authors instead of being 
missionaries were in many cases members of the 

46 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

priestly class of one of the most exclusive of re- 
ligions. 

The Jews who wrote and preserved the Old 
Testament have never seemed to find in it a war- 
rant for a missionary propaganda. It was funda- 
mentally a missionary question which caused the 
most important dispute in the early Church, a 
dispute which so nearly ended in a serious rup- 
ture. Christianity had grown out of Judaism. 
Was it to remain a Jewish faith or become a uni- 
versal religion? Must one become a Jew before 
becoming a Christian? This was the question un- 
der discussion in the Council held at Jerusalem, 
the proceedings of which Council are recorded in 
the book of The Acts. 

It may be fair to say, therefore, that the mis- 
sionary significance of the Old Testament lies 
largely in the fact that it emerges in the New 
Testament. In the bulb one does not expect to 
find the full bloom. In the presence of the blos- 
som, however, one can better understand the 
meaning of that from which it came. Viewing the 
Old Testament, then, in the clearer light of the 
New Testament era, there is to be discovered 
much that is of missionary significance. 

Monotheism. — In this light the first story of 
Genesis assumes new meaning. The broad clear 
monotheism here presented, while it does not in 
itself necessitate a missionary propaganda, does 

47 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

at least furnish one of the foundation stones 
upon which the Christian missionary enterprise 
has been constructed. It is the insistent belief 
in one God who is the God of the whole earth 
which sends the Christian with confidence to carry 
the message of the gospel to other peoples. 

The Jew to be a Medium of Blessing. — It is evi- 
dent also in the early writings of the Old Testa- 
ment that the Jew believed that in some way he 
was to be a medium of blessing to the entire world. 
Just how or when he was to carry out this wider 
mission does not seem clear. It might be by some 
miraculous process in which the Jew himself 
would be but a passive instrument in the hands 
of Jehovah. The fact that an active missionary 
propaganda was not inaugurated does not de- 
crease the significance of this conception that the 
Jew was to become the channel of universal 
blessing. "In. thee shall all the families of the 
earth be blessed," 38 is a phrase repeated in sub- 
stance no less than five times in connection with the 
stories of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. There are 
many other passages which indicate clearly that 
the Old Testament presents a universal message 
even though it may not lay out a missionary pro- 
gram. 

The Law. — The books of the Law concern them- 
selves mainly with a religion which has through- 

88 Gen. 12:3; 18:18; 22:18; 26:4; 28:14. 

48 



AND THE PROGRAM OF. JESUS 

out its history remained exclusive and non-mis- 
sionary. Provision is made for strangers within 
the camp, however. The universal and mission- 
ary elements here are at a minimum. This is the 
case also throughout the historical books, except 
as one finds therein the story of the preservation 
and of the moral and religious discipline of a small 
people, out of whom were to come a prophet and 
a religion the like of which the world had never 
seen. 

Poetry and Prophecy. — It is in the poetry and 
the prophecy of the Old Testament that those 
teachings appear which most clearly suggest the 
broad outlook of the New Testament. The Book 
of Job deals with a problem which is essentially 
universal and treats it in universal terms. 
Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Songs 
are also distinctly universal in application. The 
same is true of a large proportion of The Psalms. 
The fact that these writings deal with great funda- 
mental religious experiences is of significance, 
even though any warrant for a missionary enter- 
prise appears rather by implication than other- 
wise. 

Many of the prophecies were occasioned by 
very definite situations in the national life of the 
Jews. It is in this portion of the Old Testament, 
however, that the great forward look of the Book 
is to be found. New developments lie in the future. 

49 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

Just what these developments are to be is not al- 
ways quite clear. It is expected that in some way 
Israel is to enter upon a broader program. The 
national tribulations have tended to spiritualize 
and universalize the Jewish religion. The failure 
of the national hopes has fixed the attention upon 
a great spiritual triumph. Already Jehovah is 
judging other nations, and bestowing blessing or 
punishment upon them for the same reasons as 
upon his chosen people. This is brought out in 
many passages, particularly in Amos, Joel, Ezekiel 
and Isaiah. There is no question at all but that 
Jehovah's reign is to be universal; there is no 
question about Jehovah's compassion and love for 
the world. The part which Jehovah's followers 
are to have in making his reign universal is not 
yet clear. The missionary purpose is evident, 
the missionary program is still indefinite. It was 
difficult for the Jew to overstep the conservative 
and exclusive policy of centuries. 

Jonah. — Perhaps the most definite rebuke to 
this conservative policy is to be found in the story 
of Jonah. Jonah was in a very real sense a thor- 
oughly commissioned, if an unwilling, mission- 
ary. Here is one who is definitely sent to preach 
repentance to an alien people. Jonah's reluc- 
tance to go is an epitome of the reluctance of the 
Jew to assume the implication of his own religion. 

In rejecting the missionary program which is 

50 



AND THE PROGRAM OF. JESUS 

implicit in the Old Testament and explicit in the 
New Testament, the Jew rejected that which 
might have kept his religion from remaining a 
nationalistic religion and have made it a world 
faith. 

Missions Have a Biblical Warrant. — In the Old 
and New Testaments, we find then the warrant 
for and the program of the missionary enterprise. 
God's purpose has not changed, but man's part 
in carrying out that purpose has become clearer 
as time has advanced. A very definite and large 
responsibility for evangelizing the world clearly 
lies upon the Christian Church. It is the rare 
opportunity of Sunday-school teachers so to lead 
the pupils that as they study the Bible lessons 
they shall recognize the missionary implications 
and be ready to assume the responsibilities in- 
volved. 



51 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 



FOR DISCUSSION 

1. What had kept Judaism from being missionary and what 

compelled Christianity to become missionary 1 ? 

2. Was Christianity the contradiction of Judaism or its ful- 

fillment? 

3. In what sense is the New Testament a product of Chris- 

tian missions'? 

4. What relation does the teaching of Jesus concerning the 

kingdom bear to the missionary enterprise? 

5. In what sense was Jesus a missionary? 

6. What were the arguments for and against the missionary 

propaganda as presented in the book of The Acts? On 
what basis was the controversy finally settled? 

7. Did the early Church have in mind a world-wide propa- 

ganda or a local movement? 

8. In what ways have the missionary need and obligation 

changed since the first century? 

9. How can you emphasize effectively in your own teaching 

the missionary message of the New Testament? 

10. In what sense is the Old Testament missionary in char- 

acter? 

11. Where in the Old Testament do we find the most direct 

missionary teaching? 

12. In what ways may a teacher utilize the Old Testament for 

purposes of missionary education? 



52 



AND THE PROGRAM OF- JESUS 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

God's Missionary Plan for the World. By J. W. Bash- 
ford. Methodist Book Concern. Pp. 178; cloth, 75 
cents. 
An interpretation of God's missionary purpose as re- 
vealed in the Bible. 

God's Plan for World Redemption. By Charles R. Watson. 
Board of Foreign Missions United Presbyterian Church 
of North America (1911). Pp. 225; cloth, 50 cents. 
Presents a Biblical unfolding of this plan. 

Missions in the Plan of the Ages. By William 0. Carver. 
Fleming H. Revell Company. Cloth, $1.25. 
A series of eleven studies discussing the missionary mes- 
sage of the Bible. 

New Testament Studies in Missions. By Harlan P. 
Beach. Student Volunteer Movement (1899). Pp. 40; 
paper, 15 cents. 
A brief outline study of the missionary teachings of the 
Four Gospels, The Acts and the Pauline Epistles. 

The Bible a Missionary Book. By R. F. Horton. The 
Pilgrim Press. Pp. 190; cloth, $1.00. 
Presents a bird's-eye view of the Bible as a missionary 
book rather than a detailed study. 

The Word and the World. By Martha T. Fiske. Student 

Volunteer Movement. Cloth, 40 cents; paper, 25 

cents. 

Outline Bible studies which show in typical selections 

the fact that God's salvation was always intended for the 

whole world. 

Where the Book Speaks. By Archibald McLean. Fleming 
H. Revell Company (1907). Pp. 241; cloth, $1.00. 
Twenty-one studies in the New Testament presenting the 
thought of God as it is related to missions. 

53 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 
AND THE HOMELAND 



CHAPTER III 

THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER AND 
THE HOMELAND 

The work of the Church in the homeland is far 
more than that of giving to every person a chance 
to know about and to accept or reject Jesus 
Christ. Even this, however, is no small task in 
view of the wide geographical expanse of our 
country, the diverse conditions under which peo- 
ple live and the fact that one generation may be 
evangelized and another generation in the same 
locality may grow up without adequate oppor- 
tunity to understand and experience the Chris- 
tian religion. This is what has happened in some 
eastern states. In communities, where the Church 
was once strong, boys and girls have grown up 
without Christian instruction or training. Even 
when America is evangelized the work of the 
Church is only well begun. The task of applying 
the Christian religion to conditions of industrial, 
social and political life, which are perhaps more 
complicated than any which the world has previ- 
ously seen, remains to be accomplished. America 
is under obligation to demonstrate to the world 
that Christianity has a message sufficient for the 
complex life to be found in a great civilized na- 
tion. That this is a large and difficult task is evi- 

57 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

denced by the stories of crime, social injustice, 
graft and corruption in high circles which appear 
in the current press. The forces of evil are in- 
trenched and it is requiring all the energy and 
virility which the Christian Church possesses to 
make the principles of Jesus prevail in our land. 

America and the World. — A country, like an in- 
dividual, counts finally for what it really is. To- 
day our contacts with the countries in which our 
foreign missionaries are working are so many and 
so varied that the work of the missionaries repre- 
sent only a portion of our total impact upon the 
life of these countries. What we are in our po- 
litical, economic and social life speaks so loudly 
through the lives of tourists and business and 
political agents that many times the message of 
the missionary cannot be heard. America is 
asked to prove to the world that Christianity has 
a message and a dynamic sufficient for a great na- 
tion with a complicated political, social and eco- 
nomic order. Christianity has demonstrated its 
ability to withstand frontier conditions ; depriva- 
tion, hardship, suffering and persecution. It has 
yet to show whether it can remain virile amid 
wealth, prosperity, ease, leisure and all of the so- 
called blessings of civilization, and enlist all of 
these in the promotion of the kingdom of God. 
The world is seeking to discover whether Chris- 
tianity is the religion which it wants. The Orient 

58 



AND THE PROGRAM OF -JESUS 

is open-minded. She is looking for the very best 
in civilization, and yet such are the conditions in 
America that sometimes those who are most anx- 
ious for the best are perplexed to know whether 
Christianity is best. Christianity must dominate 
the life of this country so that she may become 
a beacon light to the world if the purpose of Jesus 
is to be carried to completion. 

Spiritual Need in Country Places. — Conditions 
are continually and rapidly changing in America 
and unforeseen situations are frequently appear- 
ing with which it is most difficult to cope. At 
present the country church presents one of these 
serious problems. In the past the rural church 
has been the feeder of the city church, and the 
teachings and ideals of the country have per- 
meated city life through the constant influx of 
rural people into the city. For a long time vague 
impressions existed that the country church was 
losing its grip upon the life of the people. It is 
only recently, however, that surveys of communi- 
ties, counties and larger areas have been made. 
These surveys have revealed an alarming condi- 
tion among country churches. Thousands of 
country churches are entirely abandoned and 
many others are not adequately reaching the rural 
populations. In cases where unnecessary dupli- 
cation of effort has existed there is much need 
for comity, federation and unity. Overchurch- 

59 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

ing has existed in many places and sectarianism 
has been overemphasized. One of the loudest 
calls of the Church to-day is for a new rural 
leadership. To become a country pastor and to 
assume the leadership in the rebuilding of a coun- 
try community, is a task the importance of which 
is second to none in the carrying out of the pro- 
gram of the Church for the evangelization and 
Christianization of America. 

The City Problem. — In the city a problem is 
faced which is even more acute. The population 
of the cities of the United States has increased 
thirty-five per cent in a decade. During the same 
time the rural population has increased only 
eleven per cent. At present forty-six per cent of 
the entire population dwells in cities. 39 More and 
more the city is dominating the national life. 
What the city is religiously, therefore, will deter- 
mine the character of the religious life of the na- 
tion. In larger cities hundreds of churches have 
either discontinued work or moved from the very 
part of the city where their ministry is most 
needed. The city is made up largely of popula- 
tion from two sources; foreign countries and the 
rural sections of our own country. Many of the 
young people coming into the city from the coun- 
try lack thorough Christian training, while the 
stream of immigration comes ever increasingly 

39 " The New Home Missions/' by H. Paul Douglass, p. 93. 

60 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

from countries where the Bible and Protestant 
Christian ideals are relatively unknown. The 
shifting of city populations makes difficult, con- 
secutive and constructive efforts for uplifting in- 
dividuals and groups of individuals. The tempta- 
tions of the city with its opportunities for cover- 
ing up evil practices imperil the moral life of 
youth and adults. The arrival of aliens who set- 
tle in large numbers in the city tends to decrease 
the proportion of Protestant Christians in the to- 
tal population, while at the same time the task of 
the Church is greatly enlarged. 

Immigration. — The city problem is not entirely 
an immigration problem, nor is the immigration 
problem entirely a city problem. These two as- 
pects of the task of the Church often tend, how- 
ever, to become merged. As compared with forty- 
six per cent of the total population living in cities, 
seventy-two per cent of our immigrant population 
dwells in the city. In some cases as high as sev- 
enty-three per cent of the children in the public 
schools in cities are children of immigrants. In 
the States of Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode 
Island, New York, New Jersey, Michigan, Wis- 
consin, Illinois, Minnesota, North Dakota, South 
Dakota, Montana and Utah, the population is al- 
ready more than half immigrant, or of immigrant 
parentage. A large proportion of these immi- 
grants have settled in cities. Most of the immi- 

61 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

gration is now coming from southeastern Europe, 
from countries where Protestant Christianity is 
little known and where the Bible is a closed book. 
To educate these people, to create Christian ideals 
in their lives, to train them in our social, political 
and religious practices, presents one of the largest 
tasks and one of the largest opportunities which 
the Church in America has ever faced. Many of 
these immigrants return every year to their na- 
tive lands, and through them we influence for good 
or bad much of the world. If we take to the immi- 
grant a Christian message while he is with us, he 
is likely to carry it with him when he returns to 
his native land. In one year (1913) 300,000 for- 
eigners who had resided in this country for a 
longer or shorter period returned to their homes 
for permanent residence there, and almost as 
many more returned for temporary residence. 
The opportunity presented to the Christian Church 
by the continual ebb and flow of this immigrant 
tide is past calculating. 

Special Needs. — European immigrants do not, 
however, make up the only groups in our popu- 
lation that make demands upon the Chris- 
tian Church. There are 3,000,000 Highlanders 
and 10,000,000 Negroes in the Southland and 
300,000 Indians scattered in various parts of the 
country. These peoples have been called "back- 
ward" and this perhaps accurately describes 

62 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

their condition. There are 46,000 unevangelized 
Indians and a large number of Southern High- 
landers as well as Negroes who do not enjoy ade- 
quate Christian privileges and blessings. In 
1914, for the first time, the Navajo Indians, many 
of whom speak no English, had a portion of the 
Bible in their own language. Over the Mexican 
border a large number of Mexicans are pouring 
into the United States. It is estimated that there 
are at present nearly a million Mexicans within 
the United States. In the great West there are 
300,000 Mormons who control politically and 
financially vast territory and large business in- 
terests. Their ideals and practices are often 
at variance with Christian standards. In scores 
of communities no permanent religious work 
other than that of the Mormon Church has ever 
been done. In lumber and construction camps 
are living several hundred thousand men, among 
whom special types of Christian work are being 
carried on, but who are largely out of vital touch 
with the Christian religion. Within compara- 
tively recent years the borders of the United 
States have been extended to take in new terri- 
tory. Alaska and Porto Rico, because of loca- 
tion and circumstances, are peculiarly a part of 
the United States, while for Cuba a new and vital 
responsibility has been assumed. Thus Eskimo, 
Aleut, Thlingit and other native stocks of the 
Northland have come into a new relationship with 

63 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

us and with their Spanish-speaking brothers at 
the opposite extremity of our borders. 

A large part of the task of the Church in Amer- 
ica is, therefore, missionary in its character. It 
is the task of carrying Christianity, with all for 
which it stands, into new communities where the 
Church has not yet become thoroughly established, 
and to groups in older communities not now en- 
joying the blessings of the Christian religion. 



RELATION OF THE SUNDAY SCHOOL TO 
THE HOME MISSION TASK 

Home Mission Workers Must Come from the 
Sunday School. — With this entire problem of 
home missions the Sunday school is concerned in 
a number of very important ways. The fact that 
home missions is one of the large present enter- 
prises of Christian society is sufficient to chal- 
lenge the teacher's attention. If Sunday-school 
pupils are, as matured adults, to become socially 
efficient Christians, they must be so instructed 
and trained that they will be in a position to de- 
termine whether the importance of home missions 
is sufficient to warrant the emphasis which the 
Church has placed upon this enterprise. If the 
answer is affirmative, they should be in a posi- 
tion to carry on this work with adequate intelli- 
gence and vigor. Without an equipment which 

64 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

will enable them to do this, they can hardly be- 
come really " socially efficient" members of a 
Christian society. 

It may always be assumed that the interests 
which society in the past has considered impor- 
tant are important unless the contrary is proved. 
From the Sunday school must come the workers 
who are to carry the gospel to the Eskimo of 
Alaska, to the native of Porto Rico and to all the 
neglected groups of people lying between these 
two extremes if America is to be evangelized. 
The Church has undertaken this task but as yet 
it has not been able to provide adequately for it. 
Many general home missionary agencies are dis- 
tressed and bewildered by the opportunities 
which are open before them and for which the 
Church is supplying neither the men nor the 
money. Sunday-school pupils, as the inheritors 
of the responsibility of the Christian Church, 
ought to be in a position to decide intelligently 
whether the work undertaken should be prose- 
cuted with renewed energy or allowed to go by 
default. 

A Christian Environment Essential for the 
Pupil. — In quite another way Sunday-school teach- 
ers are concerned with the success of the home mis- 
sion enterprise. Nothing is more clearly demon- 
strated than the influence of environment upon 
character. A Christian subjected to an un-Chris- 

65 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

tian environment will find greater difficulty in up- 
holding Christian standards. In many cases 
Christians subjected to non-Christian environ- 
ments entirely lose their Christianity. Many 
Sunday-school pupils have passed through this 
experience. A Sunday-school teacher, therefore, 
who concerns himself only with the particular in- 
dividuals in his class shows neither discretion 
nor foresight. One who builds a house on the 
edge of a volcano should know that he runs im- 
minent risk of losing the entire result of his la- 
bors. A Sunday-school teacher ought not to be- 
come so concerned with his pupils as to forget 
that they must become part and parcel of the 
national life. The stronger elements in that life 
will ultimately conquer. If the teacher, then, is 
to perform his full duty by the pupils in his class, 
he must for their sake do everything in his power 
to make the society in which they live thoroughly 
Christian. 

The population is divided by location and by 
social cleavage into various groups, but conditions 
are such that no one group lives unto itself alone. 
A cesspool of immorality in one portion of a city 
affects directly or indirectly the ideals of every 
Sunday-school pupil in the same city. Facilities 
for travel and rapid transmission of information 
tend to bring about a similar interrelation be- 
tween groups geographically separated. No 
country can become fully Christian, therefore, 

66 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

while groups of non-Christians exist within its 
borders. 

In many cases the most effective means at the 
command of the Sunday-school teacher for insur- 
ing a Christian environment for his pupils is to 
send those same pupils out to undertake the task 
of Christianizing non-Christian groups in their 
own country. This might seem foolish if the too 
common conception of a home missionary's limita- 
tions adequately presented the whole truth. It is 
not at all clear, however, that the man who gives 
himself to a needy and neglected people thereby 
limits his opportunity for acquiring the worth- 
while things of life. On the contrary, it is clear 
that by such a life of devotion to the welfare of 
others, a man thereby places himself immediately 
in line for the acquisition of the best as judged by 
Christian standards. The fact that a man is a 
Christian, however, removes any petty considera- 
tion of self. Within his circle of interests the wel- 
fare of others is included side by side with his own 
welfare. Even generations yet to be born are en- 
compassed by him. He works confidently for the 
future although he knows that the accomplish- 
ment of his desires may be long deferred. Thus 
it is that by directing the energy of a large num- 
ber of Sunday-school pupils toward the Chris- 
tianization of America, they will find their fullest 
development and their work will tend toward the 
creation of such conditions in America as will in- 

67 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

sure the permanency of the results of all Sunday- 
school teaching for the present and for future 
generations. 

The Sunday School as an Evangelistic Agency. — 
In still a third way the Sunday school as an or- 
ganization is related to the extension of Chris- 
tianity throughout the United States. Its form 
of organization is such as to make it adaptable 
for specific purposes. In the building of our 
country the Sunday school has played a most im- 
portant part. For more than three quarters of a 
century, one organization alone has established 
on an average three new Sunday schools per day. 
Many of these Sunday schools have grown into 
churches, and the lives of hundreds of thousands 
of persons have been transformed. In frontier 
places and in sparsely settled districts where a 
minister cannot be sent and where support for 
a church is not yet available, a Sunday school 
may be organized. Through it those in the com- 
munity who are already Christian are enabled to 
help themselves and to help others in the com- 
munity who have not yet become Christian but 
who are willing to attend Sunday school. 

In the same way, through Sunday-school exten- 
sion work, local churches have been able to reach 
out into new groups within the community. This 
has furnished a chance for the expression of the 
religious life of some of the older pupils in well- 

68 



AND THE PROGRAM OF- JESUS 

established schools. By serving as Sunday-school 
teachers in Sunday schools organized for par- 
ticular groups within the community, they have 
found a fuller life for themselves at the same 
time that they were extending the blessings of 
Christianity to others. Possibly at no one place 
can the church of the future do more for the ex- 
tension of the kingdom in America than in the 
field of lay evangelism through the agency of the 
Sunday school in the accessible regions round 
about well-established churches. Many dwellers 
in towns and smaller cities would be amazed to 
know that within a distance of four or five miles 
large numbers of boys and girls are growing up 
with no Christian training either in the home, in 
the Sunday school or in church. In communities 
without number this condition exists. Into such 
places groups of earnest workers may be sent. 
A Sunday school may be organized and many 
children be given the opportunity for a religious 
education which should be their heritage. The 
coming of the automobile has put within reach 
many communities which were not previously ac- 
cessible. 

Home Mission Boards will never be able to su- 
perintend this type of evangelism effectively, and 
it would hardly be desirable for them to do so 
even if they were able. Here is the particular 
responsibility of the local church — a chance for 
the expression of its religious life and an oppor- 

69 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

tunity to hasten the coming of the kingdom both 
for itself and for others. One is inclined to be- 
lieve that the future of the Christian religion in 
America lies with the local church. Whether or 
not Christianity succeeds in dominating the life 
of the nation will depend upon the way Christian 
churches assume the responsibility for the evan- 
gelization of the regions tributary to them. The 
Sunday school at once offers a method of pro- 
cedure and an organization fully capable of car- 
rying on this important work if its forces are 
properly directed. 

The Sunday School and Home Missions Insep- 
arably Related. — It is essential then that America 
shall be thoroughly and persistently evangelized 
if the results of Sunday-school teaching are to be 
conserved instead of dissipated. America will be 
evangelized only as the consecrated energy of 
Sunday-school pupils is directed toward the task. 
Because he is a Sunday-school worker, therefore, 
and because he is a Christian, every Sunday- 
school teacher is under obligation to be intelli- 
gently and earnestly concerned about the home 
mission task in America and to present it to his 
pupils as a worthy opportunity for the investment 
of a Christian's life. 



70 



AND THE PROGRAM OF -JESUS 



FOR DISCUSSION 

1. What are some of the difficult problems which confront 

the Church in America? 

2. What relation does the Sunday school bear to the evan- 

gelization of America? 

3. What boys and girls in your community unreached by 

other churches might your pupils bring to Sunday 
school? 

4. What pupils in your class are by nature particularly fitted 

for some phase of home mission work? 

5. Would you be willing to advise a boy whom you loved to 

become a missionary to the Indians, the Negroes, the 
Mexicans or other neglected groups instead of enter- 
ing a business or a professional career, if he seemed 
equally well fitted for either? Give reasons for your 
answer. 

6. In what ways are home and foreign missions related? 

7. Do you consider that the life of a country pastor or a 

worker among our foreign populations is made up en- 
tirely of self-sacrifice? What are its compensations? 

8. Should a home missionary be expected to make greater 

sacrifices than a business man who is a member of a 
local church? Why? 

9. In what way is the Sunday school dependent for success 

upon an effective home mission propaganda? 

10. Are there communities within a few miles of your church 

where boys and girls are growing up without religious 
training? If so, where? 

11. What will your Sunday school do to enlarge its home 

mission effort in the community and beyond? 



71 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

FOR THE TEACHER 

Advance in the Antilles. By Howard B. Grose. Mission- 
ary Education Movement (1910). Illustrated; pp. 
259; cloth, 60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 
A clear and careful statement of the new era in Cuba 
and Porto Rico. 

Alaska, an Empire in the Making. By John J. Underwood. 
Dodd, Mead & Co. (1913). Illustrated; pp. 440; cloth, 
$2.00. 
A most unusually interesting and readable account of the 
various phases of Alaskan life, including salmon fisheries, 
fox and reindeer farming, life in the mining towns, agri- 
cultural activities, hunting grounds, fishing, missions, edu- 
cation, and so forth. 

American Social and Religious Conditions. By Charles 
Stelzle. Fleming H. Revell Company (1912). Pp. 
240; cloth, $1.00. 
An excellent survey of needs and problems in America. 

Immigrant Forces. By William P. Shriver. Missionary 
Education Movement (1913). Illustrated; pp. 277; 
cloth, 60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 
A book which marks an epoch in the study of the increas- 
ingly important question of immigration. 

Mormonism: the Islam of America. By Bruce Kinney. 
Fleming H. Revell Company (1912). Pp. 190; cloth, 
50 cents; paper, 30 cents. 
A concise and reliable presentation of the Mormon situa- 
tion in America. 

On the Firing Line With the Sunday-School Mission- 
ary. By John M. Somerndike. The Presbyterian 

72 



AND THE PROGRAM OF -JESUS 

Board of Publication and Sabbath School Work (1914). 
Illustrated; pp. 169; cloth, 60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 
A study of the Sunday-school missionary work of the 
Presbyterian Church. 

Our Southern Highlanders. By Horace Kephart. Outing 
Publishing Company (1913). Illustrated; pp. 395; 
cloth, $2.50. 
Perhaps the most complete and accurate statement of con- 
ditions among the Southern Highlanders. 

The American Indian on the New Trail. By Thomas C. 
Moffett. Missionary Education Movement (1914). Il- 
lustrated; pp. 302; cloth, 60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 
A very satisfactory account of the progress of Christianity 
among the Indians. 

The Challenge of the City. By Josiah Strong. Mission- 
ary Education Movement (1907). Illustrated; pp. 
329; cloth, 60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 
The standard textbook on the city problem. 

The Church of the Open Country. By Warren H. Wil- 
son. Missionary Education Movement (1911). Illus- 
trated; pp. 238; cloth, 60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 
An analysis of the present rural situation and a country 
life program for the future. 

The New Home Missions. By H. Paul Douglass, Mission- 
ary Education Movement (1913). Illustrated; pp. 266; 
cloth, 60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 
An interpretation of home missions in present-day terms. 

The Upward Path. By Mary Helm. Missionary Education 
Movement (1909). Illustrated; pp. 333; cloth, 60 
cents; paper, 40 cents. 
A wise and sympathetic presentation of the Negro prob- 
lem by a Southern woman. 

73 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 



FOR THE PUPIL 

Comrades from Other Lands. By Mrs. L. A. Dimock. 
Fleming H. Revell Company. Illustrated; pp. 75; 
cloth, 40 cents; paper, 25 cents. 

A study of juvenile life in immigrant communities. 

Good Bird, the Indian. By Gilbert L. Wilson. Fleming H. 
Revell Company. Illustrated; pp. 80; cloth, 40 cents; 
paper, 25 cents. 

The story of his life as told by Good Bird himself and 
translated by Mr. Wilson. 

Goose Creek Folks. By Isabel Graham Bush and Florence 
Lillian Bush. Fleming H. Revell Company (1912). 
Pp. 224; cloth, $1.00. 

A story of the southern mountains for Juniors and Inter- 
mediates. 

Heroes of the Cross in America. By Don O. Shelton. Mis- 
sionary Education Movement (1904). Illustrated; pp. 
304; cloth, 60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 

The lives of David Brainerd, John Mason Peck, Marcus 
Whitman, John L. Dyer and Joseph Ward. 

Planting the Outposts. By R. F. Sulzer. Presbyterian 
Board of Publication (1913). Illustrated; pp. 133; 
cloth, 60 cents. 
The life story of twenty-five years of Sabbath-school mis- 
sion work on the frontier. Told by a man of ready wit, 
rare tact and perseverance. 

Pollyanna. By Eleanor H. Porter. L. C. Page & Co. (1913). 
Illustrated; pp. 310; cloth, $1.25. 

The story of the daughter of a home missionary who, on 
the death of her father, comes East to live with relatives. 

74 



AND THE PROGRAM OF. JESUS 

The Alaskan Pathfinder. By John T. Faris, D.D. Flem- 
ing H. Revell Company (1913). Illustrated; pp. 221; 
cloth, $1.00. 

An account of the life and work of Sheldon Jackson, one 
of our very greatest home missionaries. 

The Broken Wall. By Edward A. Steiner. Fleming H. 
Revell Company (1911). Illustrated; pp. 219; cloth, 
$1.00. 

This book is a collection of stories full of human interest 
written in Dr. Steiner's inimitable style. He shows by 
concrete cases how the new immigration is becoming amal- 
gamated with American life. The two veins of humor and 
pathos run side by side throughout the volume. "Com- 
mitting a Matrimony" is one of the choicest stories of the 
collection. 

The Fruit of the Desert. By Everett T. Tomlinson. 
American Baptist Publication Society (1907). Illus- 
trated; pp. 324; cloth, $1.25; postage 10 cents. 

A work of fiction, presenting the story of a young semi- 
nary graduate who goes to Oklahoma and makes good as a 
missionary. 

The Little Green God. By Caroline Atwater Mason. Flem- 
ing H. Revell Company (1902). Pp. 146; cloth, 60 
cents. 
The experiences and impressions of a missionary to India 
who returns to America after an absence of twenty-five 
years. 

The Parable of the Cherries. By Edward A. Steiner. 

Fleming H. Revell Company (1913). Pp. 64; cloth, 

50 cents. 

An interesting, five-chapter story and parable which 

teaches the eternal truth of the worth of human goodness 

be it embodied in Hebrew, Catholic or Protestant. 

75 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

The Parish of the Pines. By Thomas D. Whittles. Flem- 
ing H. Revell Company (1912). Pp. 247; cloth, $1.00. 
A concrete picture of work in the lumber woods. 

The Promised Land. By Mary Antin. Houghton Mifflin 
Company (1912). Illustrated; pp. 373; cloth, $1.75. 
The remarkable experiences of a talented Jewess born in 
Russia, who comes to America, "The Promised Land." 

Uncle Sam. By Martha S. Gielow. Fleming H. Revell Com- 
pany (1913). Illustrated; pp. 61; 50 cents. 
A mountaineer story of a man and wife who mistake 
Uncle Sam for a real uncle and who finally leave their 
mountain home for a trip to Washington to make him a 
visit. 

Winning the Oregon Country. By John T. Faris. Mis- 
sionary Education Movement (1911). Pp. 241; cloth, 
60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 
An account of the coming of the Nez Perce Indians from 
the Northwest to St. Louis for the white man's "Book of 
Heaven/' their sad departure without the Book and the go- 
ing of Marcus Whitman and Jason Lee and other early 
missionaries to the great Northwest. 



76 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHEE 
AND THE NATIONS 



CHAPTER IV 

THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER AND 
THE NATIONS 

We are living in momentous times. History is 
in process. Maps of the world are being re-made. 
Newspapers are recording great political changes 
which are affecting directly large areas and in- 
directly the entire human race. Since the begin- 
ning of the twentieth century China has become a 
republic, Korea has been annexed by Japan, 
progressive ideas have spread abroad in Turkey. 
Constitutional government has been proclaimed 
in Turkey, Persia and China. Moslem power has 
been contracting politically and is no longer a 
world menace. 

These momentous changes are of interest not 
merely from the political standpoint, but because 
of their bearing on the progress of the kingdom 
of God. The Sunday-school teacher should ever 
be in the watchtower observing such events and 
be ready to interpret them to the pupil in terms 
of the kingdom. 

Of equal importance with the political changes 
of the twentieth century is the change in mental 
attitude that has come over the world in the last 
century and a half. Two aspects of this are of 
special interest. First, the attitude of the non- 
79 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

Christian world toward Christianity, and, second, 
the attitude of the Christian Church toward the 
non-Christian world. 

Changed Mental Attitudes. — The non-Christian 
world a century and a half ago was largely iso- 
lated. Great sections were still unexplored. The 
interior of Africa was practically unknown. 
Japan, China and Korea desired no contact with 
the rest of the world. They were hermit nations. 
Means of communication and of transportation 
were exceedingly difficult. Now all this is 
changed. The explorer, the trader, the scientist, 
the diplomat and the missionary have gone to the 
four quarters of the globe and have established 
international relationships. Prejudices have 
broken down and contacts commercial, educa- 
tional, political, social and religious, have been 
established. An attitude of receptivity and reci- 
procity has replaced the attitude of isolation and 
disdain. 

The attitude of the Christian Church toward 
the non-Christian world has also undergone a re- 
markable change during the .same period. In 
1796, on the floor of the General Assembly of the 
Church of Scotland, Eev. George Hamilton, a 
commissioner, declared that "to spread abroad 
the knowledge of the gospel among barbarous and 
heathen nations seems highly preposterous in so 
far as it anticipates, nay, it even reverses the or- 

80 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

der of nature. " Doctor Ryland reflected the at- 
titude of the clergy and of the Church at large 
when he responded to William Carey's exhorta- 
tion to the English clergy to engage in foreign 
missions by saying, " Young man, sit down. 
When God pleases to convert the heathen, He will 
do it without your aid or mine." 40 The British 
East India Company at the beginning of the nine- 
teenth century said, "The sending of mission- 
aries into our eastern possessions is the maddest, 
most expensive, most unwarranted project that 
was ever proposed by a lunatic enthusiast. ' r 

It has been well said that the following words 
indicate the progress of the Church since the 
eighteenth century in its attitude toward foreign 
missions : Irrelevant, Indifferent, Impossible, 
Improbable, Imperative, Indispensable, Inevit- 
able. 41 

The agencies for propagating world-wide evan- 
gelism have increased from a dozen in 1800 to 
more than one thousand at the present time. The 
Bible has been translated into 500 different lan- 
guages and dialects so that the Scriptures are 
now available in the vernacular to approximately 
seven out of every ten of the world's population 
of 1,600,000,000. 42 It is significant too that as 



40 "Life and Times of Carey, Marshman and Ward," by John 
Clark Marshman, Edition 1859, p. 10. 

41 "The Growth of the Missionary Concept," by J. P. Goucher. 
42 "Report American Bible Society,' ' 1914, p. 12. 

81 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

many copies of the Bible and portions were sold 
recently in a single year (1912) in China as ex- 
isted in the entire world at the beginning of the 
nineteenth century, approximately, four million. 43 
Within a generation have arisen the Laymen's 
Missionary Movement, the Missionary Education 
Movement, the Student Volunteer Movement, the 
missionary departments of the Young Men's 
and Young Women's Christian Associations, the 
Christian Endeavor Society, and other organiza- 
tions of young people that have been and are 
studying missions. Within the century and a half 
have arisen practically all of the modern mission- 
ary societies. The Church's attitude of apathy 
and unconcern has given place to a deep sense of 
responsibility and an organized attempt to dis- 
charge it. 

The Present Missionary Situation Character- 
ized. — When one reviews the present missionary 
situation certain other outstanding features are no- 
ticeable. The present is a time of flux and change ; 
and of the readjustment of ideas, customs and 
institutions abroad. The worth of the individual 
in contrast to the group or the mass is now be- 
coming recognized ; woman is being elevated, the 
home purified, childhood valued and trained. It 
is a time also of social awakening and emphasis 
is laid upon Christianizing the entire social order. 

43 " The New Era in Asia," George Sherwood Eddy, p. 17. 

82 • 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

Marvelous advance and growth characterize the 
present period. 

The progress of Christianity in China, for ex- 
ample, since the opening of the twentieth cen- 
tury, far surpasses the rate of increase previ- 
ously. At the beginning of the nineteenth cen- 
tury there was not a Protestant Christian in all 
China. At the beginning of the twentieth cen- 
tury there were 100,000 Christians. To-day there 
are more than 300,000, with 2,000,000 additional 
adherents. There has been an increase of over 
two hundred per cent since 1900. The significant 
fact is that the officials and gentry are now favor- 
ably disposed to Christianity. In September, 
1914, George Sherwood Eddy, the International 
Young Men's Christian Association Secretary for 
Asia, visited Peking. President Yuan Shi Kai re- 
ceived him and expressed deep interest in his 
meetings. The Vice-President of the Eepublic, 
General Li Yuan Hung, gave him a special 
luncheon and asked him to address his family and 
guests. The Ministry of the Interior, at their own 
suggestion, granted Mr. Eddy a site for a pavilion 
for the evangelistic meetings within the Forbid- 
den City itself: "This pavilion," says Mr. Eddy, 
"was just in front of the Imperial Palace, where 
to-day resides the little boy Emperor who abdi- 
cated the Manchu throne, and where the Dowager 
Empress ruled with an iron hand from the For- 
bidden City and guided the Boxer uprising to its 

83 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

terrible conclusion. It is the first time in history 
that Christian meetings have been allowed within 
this sacred precinct. Strangely enough, the Min- 
istry suggested that we place this pavilion next to 
the sacred altar where the Emperor annually 
worshiped the ' spirits of the land/ It seemed of 
strange significance that near the spot where the 
Emperor prayed to an ' unknown God' for fruit- 
ful harvests for his people, we should have the 
priceless privilege of proclaiming God as Father 
and Jesus Christ as Saviour at the beginning of 
this great spiritual harvest among the students 
and leaders of China. 

"The response of the officials and leaders was 
most notable here in the capital" city, which has 
long been the most conservative center of China. 
At one meeting held for inquirers who were 
deemed near the point of decision for the Chris- 
tian life, I recognized one former governor, two 
generals, a private secretary to the President, the 
director of China *s national bank, prominent offi- 
cials, a young non-Christian philanthropist who 
has given this year $12,000 to Christian work, 
who is providing free education for several stu- 
dents and distributing the Bible to hundreds in 
the capital." 

On the other hand, the present is a time of re- 
action. The decadent faiths of Asia are strug- 
gling, as it were, in their death throes in an effort 
to withstand the progress of Christianity. Bud- 

84 



AND THE PROGRAM OF- JESUS 

dhism is adopting the methods and even some of 
the tenets of Christianity. Hinduism is attempt- 
ing reforms from within. "The Indian Mes- 
senger/' a Hindu paper, presents this strong 
appeal to its constituency: "Do our Hindu 
countrymen who are so lukewarm about missions 
to the depressed classes realize what the Chris- 
tianization of the masses means? It means in no 
small measure the wiping out of the hoary Hindu 
civilization. If the apathy of the Hindus con- 
tinues, the Christianization of India is only a mat- 
ter of time." 44 Mohammedanism is aggressively 
missionary in its effort to combat Christianity, 
and in Africa particularly the struggle for a con- 
tinent is on between the cross and the crescent. 
One cannot put too great stress on the crisis 
of the present situation. The Orient presents 
to-day a dilemma of chaos or Christianity 
which challenges the Church. 45 Now is the 
time of unparalleled opportunity and responsi- 
bility. 

In order to appreciate the task before the 
Church in the foreign field one must look at its 
various phases; the task numerical and geo- 
graphical, the task educational, the task medical, 
the task social, the task evangelistic. 



44 " Speaker 's Handbook/ ' United Missionary Campaign, p. 53. 
45 " The Social Aspects of Foreign Missions," by W. H. P. 
Faunce, p. 96. 

85 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 



I. THE TASK NUMERICAL AND GEO- 
GRAPHICAL 

To declare that there are at present in the non- 
Christian world approximately 1,116,000,000 peo- 
ple who do not know the gospel is a mathematical 
abstraction rather than a gripping statement of 
human need. It affects the average man about 
as much as to tell him there are 265,896 square 
miles in the State of Texas. We need a concrete 
picture of this multitude. If they formed a pro- 
cession in single file three feet apart, they would 
extend 633,040 miles or more than twenty-five 
times around the globe. Traveling at the rate of 
three miles an hour, day and night, it would take 
them twenty-four years and twenty-eight days to 
pass a given point. If they formed a procession 
two hundred abreast and three and a half feet 
apart, they would extend from New York to San 
Francisco. 

It is estimated that 500,000,000 of these people 
die in a single generation, or 41,511 every day. 
Our task is to give the gospel to our generation. 
If a single Christian should attempt to reach this 
larger multitude, spending five minutes with each 
person, working eight hours a day, it would take 
him 14,269 years to deliver his message. Evi- 
dently this task is impossible. It is the respon- 
sibility not of an individual, but of every Chris- 

86 



AND THE PROGRAM OF -JESUS • 

tian. We simply use the illustration to give some 
idea of the vast multitude who do not know Christ, 
Let us examine more specifically where these peo- 
ple are found. 

In Mexico and Central America there are 
more than twenty million people with 345 mis- 
sionaries. 

South America is truly the spiritually neglected 
continent. It is said also that it has more unex- 
plored territory than all the rest of the world to- 
gether. Its population is approximately half that 
of the United States, 54,000,000, with about 900 
Protestant missionaries. Omitting the wives of 
missionaries, each worker has a parish of 12,450 
square miles with 83,000 people. Except for 
Christian work on the fringes of the continent, 
most all of South America is practically non- 
Christian. A line can be drawn from north to 
south along which one might journey and be 
among people the whole way who do not know 
who God is. 46 Large numbers of the men in the 
more enlightened centers have left the Roman 
Catholic Church and are fast drifting into infidel- 
ity. 47 The extent of the Amazon Valley in Brazil 
is such that if the Amazon River flowed east, 
across North America and emptied into the Atlan- 
tic at New York, ocean liners could sail inland as 



46 Alan Ewbank quoted in "Missionary Programs and Inci- 
dents," by George H. Trull, p. 190. 

47 "World Outlook," February, 1915, p. 21. 

87 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

far as Omaha, Nebraska. In this valley, there 
are 373 tribes of Indians practically untouched 
by the gospel. Among them is not a single resi- 
dent Protestant missionary. 

Across the Atlantic from the neglected conti- 
nent lies the dark continent of Africa. It is "as 
large as Europe, China, India, United States, Scot- 
land, Ireland, Wales, Porto Eico and the Philip- 
pines combined. It has about one fourth the area 
of the globe. It is as large as North and South 
America combined, and is four times as large as 
either Europe or the United States. Africa is 
forty-five times as large as Texas and could swal- 
low up ten thousand states like Rhode Island. It 
is as large as the entire British Empire." 48 Eight 
hundred and forty-three languages and dialects 
are spoken by Africa's 150,000,000 people. One 
third of these are Moslems, about 8,000,000 Chris- 
tians located chiefly in South Africa, and 
92,000,000 pagans. Each missionary has a parish 
between 3,000 and 4,000 square miles with 46,000 
souls. There are five great blocks of territory in 
which there is not a single resident missionary. 
One of these is four times the size of New York 
State. Another is three times the size of New 
England. A third is eight times the size of Iowa. 
A fourth is a region 500 miles wide and 1,500 
miles long. In the upper half of the continent 
omitting the missions along the Nile and on the 

48 " World Outlook," January, 1915, p. 29. 

88 



AND THE PROGRAM OP JESUS 

Mediterraean coast, there is a region nearly as 
large as the United States with 15,000,000 with- 
out a missionary. 49 In this continent as a whole, 
50,000,000 people are outside the plans of any 
missionary society to reach. 

In the Near East of Asia, Turkey, Persia and 
Arabia, there are 31,000,000, most of whom are 
Moslems, and about 500 missionaries. In Central 
Asia including Afghanistan, Chinese and Russian 
Turkestan and Tibet, there are 23,000,000 people 
and only three mission stations. Those stations 
are located hundreds of miles apart. 

India has a population of 315,000,000, speaking 
147 different languages, ten of these being spoken 
by 10,000,000 or more people, each. Most of the 
people live in villages, of which there are so many 
that if Jesus had visited one village a day every 
day throughout the 1,900 years since his resurrec- 
tion he would not yet have visited them all. There 
are 100,000,000 people in India who cannot be 
reached by the present missionary force in this 
generation. 

Forty- two million of Japan's population of 
51,000,000 have been scarcely touched by the gos- 
pel and are unprovided for. Of Korea's 12,000,000 
many are yet unreached. 

China is the most populous country on the 
globe, with 400,000,000 people. Every fourth per- 



49 "The Call of the World, V by W. E. Doughty, Revised 
Edition, pp. 48-49. 

89 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

son in the world is a Chinese. There are 2,000 
walled cities in China and in more than 1,500 of 
these there is no resident Protestant missionary. 

In the report of the Edinburgh Ecumenical 
Conference it is stated that of the total popula- 
tion of approximately 1,100,000,000 in Asia and 
Africa, there are 119,000,000 people for whom no 
provision whatever is being made by any of the 
missionary societies. Imagine the entire popu- 
lation of the United States increased by 15,000,000 
to 20,000,000 people and the whole multitude 
pagan, without a single missionary and you get 
some idea of the needs to-day of those for whom 
no evangelistic effort whatsoever is being made. 

Do these facts grip you as a Sunday-school 
teacher? Is there any relation between this great 
unreached multitude arid your class of young peo- 
ple? 

II. THE TASK EDUCATIONAL 

But what is the condition of these millions liv- 
ing in non-Christian lands? What is the task 
from the educational standpoint? Sweeping gen- 
eralizations must be avoided. It is altogether er- 
roneous to regard all people who live in non- 
Christian lands as our inferiors intellectually. 
Some of the keenest and brightest minds are in 
India. Japan's rise to a world power in half a 
century stamps her as the intellectual equal of 
many of the peoples of the Occident, The people 

90 



AND THE PROGRAM OF- JESUS 

of China likewise have great intellectual powers, 
and elsewhere in the non-Christian world are peo- 
ple of keen intelligence. 

When we face the educational task of the for- 
eign missionary, we must recognize that the situ- 
ation varies in different lands. There are distinct 
classes of peoples. 

First. — The primitive and backward races such 
as live in parts of Africa, in the interior of South 
America, in certain islands of the sea. Many of 
these people are so backward that they have no 
written, language. In the nineteenth century 219 
languages and dialects of such peoples were re- 
duced to written form by Christian missionaries. 
But Africa has 843 languages and dialects and 
many of these yet remain in unwritten form. Such 
people have folklore and superstitions but no 
literature. Evidently the task of creating a litera- 
ture for them is no small one. This must then 
be followed by the establishing of primary and 
secondary schools, with particular attention to the 
various features of industrial training. In South 
America fifty to ninety per cent of the people are 
illiterate, and fifty to eighty-seven per cent are 
of illegitimate birth. 50 

Second. — The peoples possessing a literature 
but no modern system of education. Among these 
may be grouped all Moslem people, 226,000,000 

00 " World Outlook," February, 1915, p. 21. 

91 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

of them, scattered abroad in Turkey, Persia, 
Arabia, North Africa, Central Asia, India, China 
and elsewhere. We may also include the illiterate 
peoples of Central and South America and of Asia 
and other parts. Only a few of their fellow coun- 
trymen are literate. 

The Moslems have schools, but their education 
consists in learning the Koran and the comments 
thereon by their ancient teachers. They have lit- 
tle conception of modern learning and no desire 
for it, for their leaders have long regarded with 
contempt and fanatical hatred anything that is 
Christian. Their superstition, fanaticism and 
bigotry are intense. The illiteracy among Mos- 
lems is also very great in many lands; in 
Afghanistan, for example, it is ninety-five per 
cent. Taking India as a whole, ninety-four per 
cent of the people cannot read or write. 51 Only 
six women in 1,000 in India are literate, and in 
China only one woman in 1,000. As an accom- 
paniment of her inferior and degraded position 
in most non-Christian lands, woman has been kept 
in absolute ignorance. 

The task, therefore, of modernizing archaic 
systems of education such as exist in Moslem 
lands, and have until recently existed in China, 
and of educating the womanhood of all non-Chris- 
tian lands is stupendous and beset with many diffi- 
culties. Such institutions as Robert College in 

51 Figures based on ' ' Statesman 's Year Book, ' ' 1914. 

92 



AND THE PROGRAM OR JESUS 

Constantinople, the American School for Girls in 
the same city, the Syrian Protestant College at 
Beirut have already exerted tremendous influence 
among Moslems. Such schools are credited with 
producing the men who have been back of the Re- 
form Movements in Turkey and Persia in the first 
decade of the present century. 

China with her 400,000,000 people has but re- 
cently discarded her former system of education, 
which consisted in memorizing the teachings of 
ancient sages, and has adopted Western learning. 
Literally millions of her young people are eager 
for modern education, but the trained teaching 
force in China now available is altogether inade- 
quate. Here is an unparalleled opportunity for 
the Church to supply Christian men and women 
as educators of the future leaders of the Republic. 

Third. — Then there are the peoples in non-Chris- 
tian lands, having a modern system of education 
which needs to be Christianized. The government 
systems of education in Japan, China and in In- 
dia are cases in point. Think what a revolution 
in thinking the nebular hypothesis, the atomic 
theory, and evolution bring to those Hindus who 
had believed in a cosmogony that teaches that the 
world rests on the back of a turtle, or that when 
there is an eclipse of the moon a demon is trying 
to swallow it but may be frightened away by 
shouts and by the beating of tom-toms. 

93 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

Think what the study of modern science means 
to a Chinese, who from childhood has believed 
that earthquakes were caused by a dragon in the 
ground turning over, who has lived in a village 
or city of crooked streets so constructed for the 
purpose of confusing the evil spirits of the air 
bent on mischief. The danger is that in his re- 
volt from folklore and superstition the student 
of modern ideas may become a materialist. In 
the University of Tokyo, Japan, a religious cen- 
sus recently taken of its approximately 5,000 stu- 
dents revealed that there were among them six 
Confucianists, sixty Christians, 300 Buddhists, 
1,500 atheists and 3,000 agnostics. Does this 
show any necessity for Christianizing the educa- 
tion of the Orient? 

Who in your Sunday-school class have abilities 
that might fit them for a part in this great educa- 
tional work? 

III. THE TASK MEDICAL 

Excepting Japan, if one examines the medical 
needs of non-Christian lands, he is simply ap- 
palled at the situation. The common idea of 
disease is that it is caused by an evil spirit pos- 
sessing the patient, or that it is a god which must 
needs be propitiated. Smallpox is regarded by 
the Koreans as such a god and is spoken of as the 
" guest." The children of the family are not 
counted unless they have had this disease. The 

94 



AND THE PROGRAM OR JESUS 

treatment is to place a straw horse outside the 
home of the patient in the hope that upon it the 
god may ride away. With such ideas of the na- 
ture and treatment of disease, quarantine of in- 
fectious and contagious ailments is unknown. 
Persons with smallpox, fevers, tuberculosis, lep- 
rosy mingle at will with friends and neighbors 
and thus cause epidemics that carry off thou- 
sands. A book appeared some years ago entitled 
"Murdered Millions. " Its title truly tells the re- 
sult of heathen treatment of the sick. The needs 
are enlightenment as to the nature, cause, diag- 
nosis and treatment of disease; the establish- 
ment not merely of hospitals, but of medical 
schools and training schools for nurses, where 
the peoples of these lands may themselves be 
trained for medical and surgical service. The 
present provision for such schools in non-Chris- 
tian lands is pitifully inadequate. In all South 
America, with a population of 54,000,000, there 
are but two Protestant mission hospitals and 
three dispensaries. The two hospitals and two of 
the dispensaries are in Chile, and one dispensary 
in Brazil. There is not a Protestant missionary 
medical school in the entire continent. 52 

In the territory of pagan and Mohammedan 
Africa there is not a single missionary medical 
school. There are but thirty-seven students se- 
curing any medical training at all from individual 

52 " World Atlas of Christian Missions.' ' 

95 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

missionaries, and these are scattered among ten 
different classes, separated hundreds and thou- 
sands of miles. 52 

In Afghanistan, Tibet, Russian and Chinese 
Turkestan, there is not a physician, trained nurse 
or hospital anywhere among 23,000,000 inhabitants. 

In China there are but 207 hospitals and 292 
dispensaries for its population of 400,000,000. 52 In 
connection with medical mission work, there are 
in the entire non-Christian world but 663 native 
pupils enrolled in classes for instruction in trained 
nursing. 52 

In addition to the needs already mentioned, 
sanitation is urgently required if disease is to be 
successfully combated. Of this the non-Chris- 
tian world knows practically nothing. Many of 
the streets of China are little better than sewers. 
It is said that in Peking scores of distinct odors 
and smells are recognizable. 

One of the medical missionaries in the Sever- 
ance hospital at Seoul, Korea, in defining the 
aims of the Research Department, has outlined a 
part of the medical task in the foreign field, which 
in view of other more urgent and immediate needs, 
has hitherto had less consideration than it de- 
serves. The aims are as follows : 

To investigate the medical problems of a people that 
differ in diet, customs and habits from those previously 
studied in other countries. To investigate sanitary and 



52 " World Atlas of Christian Missions." 

96 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

hygienic problems that pertain chiefly to the home ; to 
investigate native foods and food values to determine 
average dietetic conditions and make experiments to de- 
termine the amounts of native foods necessary for life 
and for efficiency, and to investigate the value of native 
drugs used empirically for hundreds of years. 53 

According to the records of the New York 
State Medical Society in January, 1915, there were 
in greater New York City, 7,724 physicians and 
surgeons, which is more than seven times as many 
medical missionaries as there are in the entire 
non-Christian world. The 303 physicians and 
surgeons in the Boroughs of Queens and Kich- 
mond, New York City, are twenty-five more than 
the medical missionaries in all India. The city 
of Brooklyn could furnish from its physicians and 
surgeons one for every medical missionary that 
is now on the field in the entire non-Christian 
world, and still have 969 left to minister to its 
own needs. How many doctors are there in your 
community? Look them up in a classified direc- 
tory or telephone book. Some of the young peo- 
ple in your Sunday school, perhaps some in your 
class, are planning to become physicians and 
trained nurses. Point out to them the tremendous 
opportunities in the mission field for Christlike 
ministry and summon them to invest their lives 
in the places of unquestionable need. 



53 Description of Dr. Mills' work in "Personal Report" of 
Rev. E. W. Koons, Seoul, November, 1914. 

97 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

IV. THE TASK SOCIAL 

Sufficient has already been said to indicate that 
the Church has on the foreign field a social task. 
It aims by the regeneration of the individual to 
influence and uplift the social order. It also aims 
by the uplift of society to make the regeneration 
of the individual easier. Great reforms have been 
suggested, instituted and aided by missionary ef- 
fort. The abolition of opium in China and in the 
Philippines, of slavery in Africa, and of * ' suttee, ' ' 
which was the self-immolation of Hindu widows 
on the funeral pyres of their deceased husbands, 
are examples. These are some of the logical 
products of missionary effort. Much remains 
yet to be done. In India the age at which girls 
may marry needs to be raised, permission must 
be secured for widows to remarry, and the caste 
system must be destroyed. The Moslem divorce 
law which now permits a husband to divorce 
his wife at pleasure, merely by repeating thrice 
the formula, "I divorce thee," needs to be 
changed; the position of woman should be ele- 
vated and educational advantages accorded her. 
The social task of Christianity in the non-Chris- 
tian world is indicated by the existing conditions 
on the field. The Sunday-school pupil to whom 
social service appeals will find in the foreign 
field the widest possible opportunity for social up- 
lift. 

98 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

V. THE TASK EVANGELISTIC 

The primary aim of missionary endeavor is 
evangelistic, and in the attainment of it the edu- 
cational and medical work are contributory. It is 
possible to minister successfully to the ailments 
of the body and fail to reach the deeper need of 
the soul. A man may be educated and yet be 
morally and spiritually awry. The task evangel- 
istic, therefore, must ever be kept in the fore- 
ground amidst all the efforts for physical bet- 
terment, intellectual advancement and social up- 
lift. It is to replace false ideas of God, of sin, of 
salvation, of human responsibility, and of duty to 
one 's fellow man that the truth of the gospel must 
be proclaimed. The primitive animist who pro- 
pitiates the malevolent spirits needs a knowledge 
of one true God and his love to men. The Hindu 
who sanctions vice as religious, needs higher 
moral standards and the knowledge that "the soul 
that sinneth it shall die." The Buddhist who de- 
nies the worth of existence and the reality of sin 
needs to be taught the value of life and of ambi- 
tion and the need for redemption. The Con- 
fucianist who has a high code of morals to which he 
cannot live up to needs to experience the dynamic 
of the gospel. The Moslem who so stresses the 
sovereignty of God as to become a fatalist, and 
who places Mohammed above Christ, needs to 
learn that man is accountable because of his free- 

99 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

dom of choice, and that God is love and that his 
highest revelation of himself is in Jesus Christ. 

The Challenge of Foreign Missions. — Surely 
here is a task for the Sunday-school pupil of to- 
day, when choosing his life work, to go among 
peoples abroad to whom he can interpret through 
his life and work the deep things of God. If 
Christianity is ever to appeal to non-Christian 
peoples, it must be lived in their midst. Where 
shall we look for such ambassadors of Christ if 
not to the Sunday schools? George Sherwood 
Eddy at the Student Volunteer Convention in 
Rochester in 1911 threw down this challenge to 
the young men and women there gathered: "Is 
your Christianity worth propagating?" That 
Christianity is worth propagating is not debat- 
able, but it is a fair question whether your type 
of Christianity, the type of Christianity repre- 
sented by the average Sunday-school pupil of to- 
day who is a Christian, is worth passing on to 
peoples who already have religions of their own, 
and with which many of them are satisfied. Is the 
Christianity of the boys and girls, or of the young 
men and women of your class so infinitely su- 
perior to the religions of the non-Christian lands 
that you would as a Sunday-school teacher be 
eager to send any or all of them forth as mission- 
aries ? Is their religion so vital, so much a thing 
of power that it would bear exporting? If it is 

100 



AND THE PROGRAM OP JESUS 

not of the missionary type, if it is formal and 
cold and lacks stamina and vitality, it is your op- 
portunity as a Sunday-school teacher to put be- 
fore them higher ideals of Christian living and 
service. To put such ideals before your class de- 
mands of you as a Sunday-school teacher the high- 
est type of spiritual life. 



101 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 



FOR DISCUSSION 

1. What do you mean by world evangelization? 

2. Distinguish from world Christianization. 

3. Why is world evangelization easier to-day than a century 

ago? Give several reasons and select the three which 
are strongest. 

4. What factors make world evangelization difficult to-day? 

Enumerate those on the foreign field and those in the 
home church. 

5. Is the curriculum of your local Sunday school planned 

with the definite aim of training the Sunday-school 
members to become missionary workers and supporters? 

6. How can the curriculum be strengthened to secure these 

ends? 

7. How can our Sunday school more efficiently exert a world 

influence? (Show that by intercessory prayer great 
spiritual energies are released, and that prayer must 
be followed by the consecration of gifts and life.) 

8. Which phase of the foreign mission task do you consider 

(a) the most difficult? Why? 

(b) the most immediate? Why? 

(c) the most strategic? Why? 

9. For which phases of the task are any members of your 

Sunday-school class best suited? 

10. How can you best present privately to these pupils the 
claim of the foreign field upon them for life service? 



102 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

FOR THE TEACHER 

Community Study for Cities. By Warren H. Wilson. 
Missionary Education Movement. Paper, 35 cents. 
A series of questions suggesting twelve different lines of 
investigation dealing with the life of the community. 

Community Study for Country Districts. By Anna B. 
Taft. Missionary Education Movement. Paper, 35 
cents. 
These twelve chapters present a series of studies for the 
investigation of local rural communities. 

Educational Missions. By James L. Barton. Student Vol- 
unteer Movement (1913) Illustrated; pp. 268; cloth, 
75 cents; paper, 50 cents. 
This book has been prepared to meet a strong demand in 
the colleges; treats a subject of expanding interest and of 
the most pressing importance. 

Growth of the Missionary Concept. By J. F. Goucher. 
Eaton & Mains (1911). Pp. 202; cloth, 75 cents. 
Traces the growth of the missionary idea through the fol- 
lowing stages, "impossible," "improbable," "imperative," 
"indispensable" and "inevitable." 

Jungle Days. By Arley Munson. D. Appleton & Co. Illus- 
trated; pp. 298; cloth, $2.50. 
An interesting account of the experiences and observations 
of Dr. Arley Munson, while engaged in medical work in 
Sholapur and touring the region round about. 

Social Christianity in the Orient. By John E. Clousrh. 

Macmillan Company (1914). Illustrated; pp. 409; 

cloth, $1.50. 

A first-hand picture of life in India and at the same time 

a biography of great interest. A recounting of the social, 

103 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHEE 

economic and religious principles which lay back of the 
methods of Dr. John E. Clough. 

The Appeal of Medical Missions. By R. Fletcher Moore- 
head. Fleming H. Revell Company. Cloth, $1.00. 

A general survey of the considerations upon which med- 
ical missions are based. 

The Call of the World. By W. E. Doughty. Missionary 

Education Movement (1912). Pp. Ill; cloth, 25 cents. 

A four-chapter book, presenting the world missionary 

enterprise. It is useful for groups of men and groups of 

Sunday-school workers desiring a broad outlook of the 

world field. 

The Decisive Hour of Christian Missions. By John R. 
Mott. Missionary Education Movement (1910). Cloth, 
60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 
Based on the reports of the Missionary Conference held 
in Edinburgh, July, 1910. 

The Growth of the Kingdom of God. S. L. Gulick. Pil- 
grim Press (1910). Pp. 221; cloth, 50 cents. 
Outline Studies: 1. Growth in Understanding; 2. Growth 
in Numbers; 3. Growth in Practice; 4. Growth in In- 
fluence; 5. A General View. 

The Individual and the Social Gospel. By Shailer 
Mathews. Missionary Education Movement (1914). 
Cloth, 25 cents. 
A brief four-chapter book showing the relation of the 
individual to social needs. 

The Social Aspects of Foreign Missions. By W. H. P. 
Faunce. Missionary Education Movement (1914). Il- 
lustrated; pp. 309; cloth, 60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 

A presentation of the various types of the social order 
in the East and West, their influence one upon the other, 
and the more notable social achievements of missionaries. 

104 



AND THE PKOGRAM OP JESUS 

The Unfinished Task. By James L. Barton. Student Vol- 
unteer Movement (1908). Pp. 221; cloth, 50 cents; 
paper, 35 cents. 
An introductory study of the problem of evangelizing 
the world. The meaning of the problem, the territory to 
be occupied and the difficulties to be overcome are stated in 
a clear and masterly way, and grounds are given for con- 
fidently expecting success in the enterprise. 

Western Women in Eastern Lands. By Helen Barrett 
Montgomery. Macmillan Company. Pp. 286; cloth, 
50 cents; paper, 30 cents. 

Written especially for women's missionary societies. 

Within the Purdah. By S. Armstrong-Hopkins, M.D. 
Eaton & Mains. Illustrated; pp. 248; cloth, $1.00. 
The personal observations of a medical missionary in 
northwest India. Also an account of experiences in the 
zenana homes of Indian princes. 



FOR THE PUPIL 

Popular books that will acquaint the pupil of Intermediate 
age and above with conditions in foreign lands. 

Ann of Ava. By Ethel Daniels Hubbard. Missionary Edu- 
cation Movement (1913). Illustrated; pp. 245; cloth, 
60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 
An account of the remarkable life of Ann Haseltine 
Judson, of Burma, written especially for girls. 

Daybreak in Korea. By Annie L. A. Baird. Fleming H. 
Revell Company (1909). Illustrated; pp. 123; cloth, 
60 cents. 
A story depicting the life of the Korean woman in a most 
interesting manner. 

105 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

Fetish Folk in West Africa. By Robert H. Milligan. 
Fleming H. Revell Company (1912). Illustrated; pp. 
328; cloth, $1.50. 

A popular study of the African, with special emphasis 
upon his beliefs and superstitions. 

Fifty Missionary Heroes Every Boy and Girl Should 
Know. By Julia H. Johnston (1913). Pp. 222; 
cloth, $1.00. 

Brief but attractive accounts, with pictures, of mission- 
ary heroes with whom boys and girls should be acquainted. 

Jungle Folk in Africa. By Robert H. Milligan. Fleming 
H. Revell Company (1908). Illustrated; pp. 380; 
cloth, $1.50. 

A most readable book, containing a great deal of infor- 
mation about African life and missionaries' experiences. 

Livingstone the Pathfinder. By Basil Mathews. Mission- 
ary Education Movement. Illustrated; pp. 202; cloth, 
60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 
Boys and girls will enjoy this story of David Livingstone 
who spent so many of his days in camp life. 

Love Stories of Great Missionaries. By Belle M. Brain. 

Fleming H. Revell Company (1913). Illustrated; pp. 

75; board, 50 cents. 

Contains an account of the love affairs of Adoniram 

Judson, Robert Moffatt, David Livingstone, James Gilmore, 

Francois Coillard and Henry Martyn. It is dedicated to 

the girl who is tempted to say "No" to her lover who is a 

missionary volunteer. 

The Black Bearded Barbarian. By Marian Keith. Mis- 
sionary Education Movement. Illustrated; pp. 307; 
cloth, 60 cents, paper, 40 cents. 

The remarkable story of George Leslie Mackay, of For- 
mosa. One of the very best books for boys. 

106 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

The Dragon and the Cross. By Ralph D. Paine. Charles 
Scribner's Sons. Illustrated; pp. 241; cloth, $1.25. 

This book will appeal to every adolescent who admires 
grit and courage. The hero is the son of a missionary in 
China who has some thrilling experiences. 

Uganda's White Man of Work. By Sophia Lyon Fahs. 
Missionary Education Movement (1907). Illustrated; 
pp. 289; cloth, 60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 

The life of a young mechanic, Alexander Mackay, who 
revolutionized a kingdom in Africa. 

Under Marching Orders. By Ethel Daniels Hubbard. Mis- 
sionary Education Movement (1909). Illustrated; pp. 
222; cloth, 60 cents; paper, 40 cents. 
A study of Mary Porter Gamewell, one of the most in- 
teresting pioneer missionaries to China. 



107 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 
AND KINGDOM INVESTMENTS 



CHAPTER V 

THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER AND 
KINGDOM INVESTMENTS 

"I want to be a missionary, " said a ten-year- 
old girl one day to her mother. Too young to 
make a life choice, did you say? Yet not too 
young to declare a present desire and intention, 
which, if cherished, will in all probability crystal- 
lize into a life decision later. Young children can- 
not make life choices, but they can express present 
desires. These may be the same as life choices 
made later. What was back of the ten-year-old 
girl's expressed desire to become a missionary? 
The immediate background was a missionary 
meeting in which several young people had volun- 
teered for service, but back of that was a Chris- 
tian home and a training both in the home and 
church which stressed the beauty of the Chris- 
tian life and the need of unselfish service for 
Christ and others. The parents had not only 
taught Christian precepts but exemplified them, 
and the declaration of the child was, with such 
environment and training, but natural. 

Spiritual Atmosphere and the Missionary De- 
cision. — It is not unnatural to expect missionary 
decisions from young people, if in the home and 

111 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

the church they are surrounded with such influ- 
ences as make missionary service the normal ex- 
pression of the Christian life. Many missionaries 
have declared that in very early life they had the 
desire and intention to become missionaries. 
Others have received their call after they had 
passed out of childhood. The Church in the past 
has in large measure regarded missionary serv- 
ice as unusual. There are hundreds of churches 
all over the land that have never produced in all 
their history a single home or foreign missionary 
or a minister of the gospel. Others have pro- 
duced only one or two or several. That church 
which every year is producing one or more mis- 
sionaries or ministers of the gospel is exceptional, 
if in fact it exists at all. Too frequently the 
church and the Sunday school seem content with 
holding services, rather than with producing 
trained and efficient workers. 

Many Church Members Inefficient. — The pastor 
of a prominent church of six hundred and fifty 
members in the central west said, "I have but one 
hundred in my church that can be depended on." 
Of the church membership of the United States 
twenty per cent efficient is probably a high aver- 
age. It is said that, if it were possible to cause 
the temperature of an agricultural district to rise 
no higher than sixty-five degrees, corn would not 
thrive, wheat would not mature, apples would not 

112 



AND THE PROGRAM OF- JESUS 

ripen. The difficulty in the church is lowered 
spiritual temperature in which strong Christian 
character does not mature. 

If we are to expect missionary decisions in any 
large numbers in our Sunday schools, the spirit- 
ual atmosphere must be charged with more power. 
When we have higher ideals of service exempli- 
fied by consistent Christian living, missionary ef- 
fort will be considered not unusual but a normal 
expression of Christian experience. The Sunday 
school should endeavor to promote such living on 
the part of its members that the children in the 
early and impressionable years of life may grow 
up in a vital spiritual atmosphere. Then, when 
the missionary seed is planted in the child's mind 
and heart, there is every probability that it will 
come to fruition. 

Value of Records of Spiritual Growth. — Accu- 
rate record of the manifestation of missionary 
interest on the part of pupils should be kept. 
Unless this is done, the interest apparent to-day 
may be dissipated by some counteracting influ- 
ence to-morrow. Spiritual impulses must be 
nourished and strengthened. If a primary child 
is interested in some other needy child of whom he 
hears and to whom he wishes to give a plaything 
or other gift to brighten the other's life, record 
this generous impulse and give it opportunity to 
express itself again. It is not uncommon to get 

113 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

from such young children expressions of gener- 
osity and of desire to serve others. We must 
cherish these good impulses and strengthen them 
by giving opportunity for repeated expression. 
When a pupil passes from one grade or depart- 
ment to another, the new teacher should regard 
him not merely as a promoted pupil, but from 
the files of the school should know his record. 
Such record should include the pupil's interests, 
his desires, his ambitions, the forms of service 
in which he has engaged, the character of his 
home and such other things about him as will 
make the teacher intelligent and sympathetic in 
his dealing with the pupil as an individual. These 
records are not for public examination, but should 
be held in strict confidence. 

It is essential also that inspiring information 
should be given concerning needs and heroic 
missionary achievements. Interest in missionary 
work will be aroused in the pupils as they are in- 
formed of conditions and opportunities on the 
mission field. From the platform and in the 
class, missionary instruction must be system- 
atically given. Missionary biography will be of 
the greatest value in influencing the choice of a 
life work. Who can read the brief history of Dr. 
Arthur Jackson 54 of Manchuria without admir- 
ing his devotion and without feeling the appeal 

54 See "The Life of Dr. Arthur Jackson of Manchuria/ ' by 
Alfred J. Costain. 

114 



AND THE PROGRAM OE JESUS 

of the heroic? This young Scotch physician vol- 
unteered to fight the deadly pneumonic plague and 
heroically died at his post, only ten weeks after 
his arrival on the mission field. Who can read 
of the sacrifice and the splendid achievements of 
Stephen A. Paxson, the intrepid and untiring 
home missionary, without a challenge to make the 
most of one's own opportunities for altruistic 
service ? 

Missionary Contacts. — In addition to biography, 
bring your pupils into personal touch with fur- 
loughed missionaries from the home and foreign 
fields. Arrange not only to have such mission- 
aries address the Sunday school from the plat- 
form, but bring them into closer touch with your 
pupils. Bring them into the class, where at close 
range the pupils may ask questions and learn 
further of such particular features of the mis- 
sionary's work as enlist their interest. If pos- 
sible, arrange for an informal social gathering 
in your home where, about the fireplace, or 
around the center table, the missionary may tell 
his personal experiences to your pupils. They 
will never forget such close and vital touch. Their 
ideas of missionaries and of missionary service 
will in all probability be greatly modified, and 
they will realize that the missionary is not a 
medieval saint with a halo, but a modern twenti- 
eth century . knight, engaged in a task which de- 

115 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

mands such qualities and abilities as they them- 
selves possess. Make the most, therefore, of per- 
sonal acquaintance with missionaries of the best 
type if you would secure decisions for mission- 
ary service from your pupils. 

Results of One Teacher's Efforts. — The teacher 
should seek to help the pupil choose that life work 
in which his highest self-development will be se- 
cured, and his greatest service to humanity be 
rendered. Thus will he best glorify God. The 
success of a teacher in these respects is told by 
Rev. William A. Brown, General Field Secretary 
of the International Sunday School Association: 

"More than thirty years ago a young man with 
his bride went to live in a little prairie town in 
Kansas. A struggling Sunday school was in need 
of workers, and the young woman was asked to 
help in the work of the school. Although her 
baby girl was very frail, yet the mother accepted 
the responsibility for the 'infant class, ' as they 
called the primary department in those days, and 
she often taught her class, holding the sick child 
on a pillow in her arms. Closely confined to her 
home by the responsible duties of the household, 
the mother could not call upon the members of 
her class and instead she had them come to see 
her. She organized them into a mission band and 
the Bible class on Sundays met as a missionary 
group on week days. There were never more 

116 



AND THE PKOGRAM OF JESUS 

than fifteen in the entire class, and yet the teacher 
set them to work raising chickens and growing 
things, and by and by they had money enough to 
support a Bible woman in China. The programs 
for the week-day sessions consisted largely of 
missionary stories and incidents, and the children 
became tremendously interested in the work of 
Christ in the world. But that was a long, long 
while ago, long enough to test the value of such a 
program, and the fifteen little tots grew to be 
men and women and to-day all are united in the 
work of the kingdom. One of the little tots grown 
big went as a missionary to Africa, and when her 
husband died of the fever she later came home 
and is now the head of a splendid mission school 
in the United States. Another went as the wife of 
a missionary to the Philippine Islands. A third 
member of that little group of fifteen became a 
medical missionary in the Philippines, Another 
became the head of a great Christian Association 
in the Orient and still another labored with her 
husband in the regions of Alaska. In a letter to 
the teacher of the mission band, who had scarcety 
been outside of Kansas at that time, she said, 
'You know, I can never forget the little mission 
band, for in it you made each one of us feel as 
though we ought to be missionaries/ " 

Motives Influencing Life Choices. — Note that 
the aim must not be to control the pupil's decision 

117 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

of a life work, but only to aid him so that he may 
make his own decision. There are many voices 
clamoring for attention when the young person in 
the Senior period reaches the time of vocational 
awakening. Business, politics, science, education, 
law, medicine, farming, manufacturing, the army, 
the navy, and other spheres of activity all pre- 
sent their claims. Into any one of them a young 
person may enter with the motive of self -advance- 
ment and self -enrichment, or of benefiting society 
and glorifying God. In the advertisements for 
men to join the United States Army and Navy 
the appeal is to such motives as the desire for 
travel, athletics, education, good pay, promotion, 
care in sickness, and pension after service. The 
motives appealed to are egoistic rather than altru- 
istic Or even patriotic. Likewise the young woman 
has opportunities opening before her in domestic, 
business or professional life. Which shall the 
young man or the young woman choose? and 
what motives shall enter into the decision? On 
the one hand are the egoistic, on the other the 
altruistic. Many factors enter into the choice of 
a life work, such as one's natural ability, tem- 
perament, preferences and the present oppor- 
tunity. While the Sunday-school teacher must 
take all these into account as he seeks to help the 
pupil in his decision, the main things to which the 
teacher must give attention are the underlying 
motives and the aims which the pupil has as he 

118 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

chooses. It is manifestly wrong for the Sunday 
school to seek merely for sentimental reasons to 
influence toward missionary service or the min- 
istry, pupils whose natural gifts, temperament 
and interests render them unfit. All such the 
Sunday school should seek to direct into some 
other sphere of activity, always attempting, how- 
ever, to instill the highest motives and noblest 
aims, whatever the life work may be. 

Some Missionary Opportunities. — Disabuse pu- 
pil's minds of the idea that all missionaries are 
ordained. There is an increasing demand for lay- 
men as industrial teachers, mission treasurers, 
educators, medical men, and in other positions. 
The following opportunities requiring much di- 
versity of talent, have recently been presented: 

Mek 

Engineers: Civil, mechanical, electrical, sani- 
tary, mining. 

Teachers: English, French, German, music, 
mathematics, agriculture, philosophy, accounting 
and commerce, manual training, economics, his- 
tory. 

Physical Directors: To develop out-of-door 
sports, gymnasium work. 

Architects and Supervising Builders. 

Physicians and Surgeons: To serve in hospitals 
and to itinerate. 

Business Managers: For mission stations and 
colleges. 

119 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

Stenographers: To serve as private secretaries 
and to teach stenography and commercial sub- 
jects. 

Printers: As superintendents and foremen of 
mission presses. 

Ordained Preachers: To serve as evangelists, 
to organize native churches, to teach in theolog- 
ical seminaries, and to preach to English-speaking 
congregations. 

Women 

Physicians and Surgeons: To serve in hospitals 
and to itinerate. 

Nurses: To train native workers where hos- 
pitals are established, or to begin work under 
primitive conditions. 

Kinder gartners. 

Bible Teachers and Evangelists: To lead train- 
ing classes of native women ; to visit in the homes 
and zenanas; to teach the Bible in girls' schools, 
and to itinerate among villages. 

Teachers: General subjects in the primary, in- 
termediate and advanced grades, requiring col- 
lege or normal training; biology, mathematics, 
music. 

Physical Directors. 

Superintendents: To have charge of orphan- 
ages and student hostels. 55 

Who of your pupils might fill such a position 
as one of these at home or abroad? 



55 The Student Volunteer Movement each year issues a list of the 
needs as stated by the various Foreign Mission Boards. Address 
25 Madison Avenue, New York City. For Home Mission oppor- 
tunities communicate with your denominational Board. 

120 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

We hear it frequently said that not all persons 
can be missionaries. This is true in the official 
sense of the term, but altogether untrue in the 
broader sense. The word "missionary" means 
"one who is sent." Every Christian is one sent 
to bear witness for Christ, to his fellows and to 
his community, no matter where he dwells. Be- 
cause the Korean believers accept this conception 
of the Christian life, every one is a living wit- 
ness, proclaiming the gospel to others. It is the 
patent duty of the Sunday school so to train all of 
its members that they shall become missionaries 
of this sort. Broad missionary vision and deep 
missionary passion should result from training 
in the Sunday school whether or not the pupil re- 
ceives and responds to the call to the official serv- 
ice on the home or foreign field. 

Missionary Service for Every Christian. — The 
majority of pupils in the average Sunday school 
of to-day are not going to become home or for- 
eign missionaries in the restricted meaning of the 
term. They are going into business, into the 
trades or professions, but they should be none 
the less missionary in spirit than those who actu- 
ally go to the home or foreign field. Their obli- 
gation to obey the Great Commission of our Lord 
is just the same as is the missionary's. If God 
calls them into business, the trades or professions, 
it is that these may all minister to the fulfillment 

121 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

of their missionary obligation. " Every honor- 
able occupation, ' ' says Henry B. Wright, * ' should 
be a Christian ministry. The professions and 
trades of men should not be divided into two hos- 
tile camps, the religious and the secular. 

"The prevalent modern idea that, if a man de- 
cides not to be a missionary or a minister he is 
relieved from all further responsibility for Chris- 
tian work, is utterly false and pernicious. The 
decision not to be a clergyman, if a man be a 
Christian at all, is in fact his act of enlistment 
in active evangelization. The clergyman may 
spend much time in his study with the theory of 
religion. "We shall find no fault with him if he 
does. But the layman must evangelize. The idea 
that all the Christian layman is under obligations 
to do is to be an officer in the church, make a 
regular contribution or hold down a pew on Sun- 
day, is pagan. It is just as ridiculous as if at the 
outbreak of a war the cadets at West Point and 
all the graduates should club together and hire 
the instructors there to go to the front and do 
the fighting while they either sit and look on, 
hear the reports from the front or listen to the 
military band." 56 

Adequate Support Needed. — In the extension of 
the kingdom throughout the world there is needed 



56 "The Will of God and a Man's Lifework," by Henry B. 
Wright, pp. 90, 98. 

122 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

not merely the investment of life but of money. 
The need of the hour is an adequate support from 
the home base of the missionary enterprise, both 
home and foreign. 

The Moravian Church in Saxony was in its 
early days, in 1733, divided into two classes, those 
who actually went to the field as missionaries and 
those who remained at home to work and sacri- 
fice to support them. Count Zindzendorf, the 
founder of the Moravian Church, "held himself 
and his baronial estate liable for the financial ob- 
ligations of all Moravian institutions." 57 Mani- 
festly there must be a home base for the mission- 
ary enterprise, and those attached to it should be 
men and women whose real business is to serve 
the Lord and extend his kingdom. 

One of the leading foreign missionary societies, 
which has 1,226 missionaries on the field in six- 
teen different lands, is supporting, with the aid 
of the native church, 5,766 native workers, 173 
hospitals and dispensaries (in which were treated 
in one year nearly half a million patients), is 
maintaining 1,781 schools and colleges, with over 
64,000 pupils, and is supporting ten mission 
presses, which issued in a single year more than 
95,000,000 pages of literature, and all at a cost of 
less than one half the annual budget of one of our 
American universities, Columbia, New York City. 



57 "A Man and His Money," by H. R. Calkins, pp. 79, 81. 

123 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

To support all this vast and varied work the 
denomination back of this missionary society gave 
$1.49 per member for the year, or less than three 
cents a week per member. The same denomina- 
tion gave the corresponding year for its home 
mission work, $1.33 per member, or about two 
and a half cents per week. The gifts by the de- 
nomination mentioned are among the first five in 
the list of largest per capita gifts to foreign mis- 
sions by Protestant denominations of the United 
States. When one considers the magnitude of 
the need and the greatness of the opportunity, it 
looks as if this denomination, and in fact the 
church at large at the home base, had not yet as 
a whole seriously undertaken the financing of the 
missionary task. Three cents per week per mem- 
ber will never conduct the missionary enterprise 
on a world scale adequate to the needs. 

The same foreign missionary society above 
mentioned is annually paring down the estimates 
which the missionaries ask for new and advanced 
work. Recently, for lack of accommodation, it 
has had to turn away from one of its schools in 
the Philippines two hundred and fifty boys who 
sought an education. It has had to refuse to open 
a new station in Africa, which promises as great 
returns as one of the present stations, where, 
during a recent year, ten hundred and forty-nine 
persons were received into full church member- 
ship, and where, in addition, two thousand were 

124 



AND THE PROGRAM OF- JESUS 

enrolled in the second year probationer's class 
in preparation for cliurch membership, and thir- 
teen thousand in the first year's class. 

What Some Missionaries Are Doing. — The Sun- 
day school has, then, a very distinct obligation 
to inculcate such ideas of Christian stewardship 
that the work of the missionary enterprise may 
be adequately financed. Many missionaries on 
the field, men and women of the highest type of 
Christian culture, are gladly giving their all. A 
medical missionary in China has recently opened a 
new hospital at Chefoo costing more than $30,000, 
a large part of which he gave himself. An- 
other missionary, whose work is in India, a man 
of wonderful medical skill, is receiving a salary 
of $100 a month. The Maharajah of Kolhapur 
said of him, "If he should go to Bomaby or Poona 
to practice, his income would not be one farthing 
less than 6,000 rupees ($2,000) a month." 58 He 
prefers to labor as a medical missionary, with 
an income barely sufficient for his needs, rather 
than practice his profession to make money. Still 
another missionary in China writes : " If it seems 
sometimes we do very little to help financially, 
please remember that practically every one of us 
has one or more Chinese students in training 
somewhere. We maintain a Chinese bov and a 



58 "Around the World Studies and Stories of Presbyterian For- 
eign Missions/' by Drs. Bradt, King and Reherd, p. 119. 

125 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

Chinese girl in school, and they can only stay there 

while we support them. Years ago Mrs. L 

(his wife) and I found out that such investments 
pay well as a rule. By making a little sacrifice 
some years ago, we put three boys through med- 
ical school and two of them are here doing the 
bulk of the work in our hospital, and one is help- 
ing Mr. J at Taoyuen. The day before the 

Board's letter came, we decided that we must 
share a little of the tiny surplus we have been 
able to put by, by doing without a vacation for 
two summers." 

These illustrations of the investment of life and 
money on the part of the missionaries themselves 
should incite Christians at home to a like conse- 
cration. The fact is, however, that there are 
church members to-day all over America who 
openly declare they do not believe in missions, 
and they are unaware of their spiritual defection. 
Some people who have been pupils in the Sunday 
school have neither missionary vision nor pas- 
sion. They are absorbed in their individual pur- 
suits, in the acquisition of wealth, in personal 
pleasures, and have no vital interest in the ad- 
vancement of God's kingdom on earth, though 
they may repeat daily, ' \ Thy Kingdom come. 
Thy will be done, as in heaven, so on earth." An 
illustration may make this clear. 

A church member in Illinois, worth at least 
$350,000, one Sunday morning after church heart- 

126 



AND THE PROGRAM OF- JESUS 

ily commended a speaker representing a home 
missionary cause. He shook his hand warmly 
and said he endorsed his sentiments that it was 
necessary to save America, and added that he 
did not believe in sending money across the seas. 
The speaker, on the following day, inquired of 
a resident of the town for the names of persons 
who were able to contribute to the cause he rep- 
resented. He was given, among others, the name 
of the man who had commended his address 
on Sunday morning. Accordingly he called 
upon the man who indignantly inquired: "What 
do you come to m<e for? I gave twenty-five 
cents toward your work in church yesterday 
morning. ' ' 

Some Illustrations of Good Stewards. — On the 
other hand, there are many men and women who 
fully recognize their stewardship and who are dis- 
charging it. A whole family of business men, 
father and brothers, in the city of Toronto, have 
adopted the practice of giving every cent they 
make over and above their actual expenses, to the 
extension of the kingdom of heaven on earth. 
They are in business to make money for the pur- 
pose of extending the kingdom of Christ, 

Mr. Shenstone, at the close of an address on 
"Stewardship" in the Buffalo convention of the 
Laymen's Missionary Movement, in 1909, was 
asked by Mr. Campbell White what rule he had 

127 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

adopted. He replied that early in his business 
life he had given ten per cent; finding himself 
making too much money on the balance he gave 
twenty-five per cent; still not satisfied, he cut his 
income in two. Mr. White asked him where he 
had stopped, when Mr. Shenstone asserted that 
he now refused to add another dollar to his capi- 
tal wealth, but determined to give every cent over 
and above his actual family expenses to the ex- 
tension of the kingdom of Christ on earth. 

In the city of Philadelphia there is to-day a 
Christian business man who has had a financial 
and missionary conversion. Instead of devoting 
his time to amassing larger sums for himself, his 
main interest is the promotion of the kingdom. 
He has made several trips to the Orient studying 
heathenism and the needs of the mission field at 
first hand. He has opened an office and employs 
a staff of workers for the express purpose of pro- 
moting the cause of missions. 

Miss Grace H. Dodge, of New York, who died 
in December, 1914, was a woman of large wealth 
and a good steward. Her benevolences were local, 
national and world-wide. An editorial in the New 
York Evening Post pays this tribute: 

"Society editors found nothing at all to inter- 
est them in the happenings of her spacious home, 
for they were usually earnest, religious gather- 
ings, and always dealt with some problem of bet- 
tering humanity. She had a talent for avoiding 

128 



AND THE PROGRAM OF, JESUS 

publicity; or, better, hers was the true modesty 
which shrinks from any heralding of good deeds, 
however great their unselfishness and generosity. 
She always had time to attend to her benefactions, 
and to put into them something of her large- 
hearted self; and that free giving of herself was 
her greatest contribution. Few men or women 
have ever shown so great a sense of the social 
responsibility of wealth. It may be trite to say 
it, but there would be little objection to the amass- 
ing of wealth, if it could always be in the hands 
of such trustees as Miss Dodge and the members 
of her family. Certainly her life was wholly given 
to others, yet hers was not a somber personality, 
or one too absorbed in large affairs to take the 
keenest human interest in all things about her. 
She must rank as one of the country's great bene- 
factors, though she would have been quick to 
deny it; and she concealed much of her giving, 
so that probably no one will ever know its ex- 
tent." 

The Need of the Hour. — The need of the hour is 
for consecrated acres and farms, factories and 
mills, offices and shops; Christian men actually 
in partnership with God, and as missionaries in 
spirit using their business or profession to pro- 
mote the kingdom of God rather than to amass 
fortunes for themselves. Hon. Chester W. Kings- 
ley used to say, "Lord, give me a hand to get and 

129 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

a heart to give." These were his expressed con- 
victions regarding money. "Why should not a 
Christian business man open an account with the 
Lord in his ledger and treat it with all the sanc- 
tity and promptness that he would his account 
with any business firm? Eesolved to do it." 59 
And he did. As a result he gave away as God's 
steward half a million dollars. 

The president of a successful manufacturing 
company in Kansas has incorporated a benevolent 
association, so that if his business continues profit- 
able, funds which he has been giving to God's 
work may after his demise be used in the same 
or similar channels. His sons became the origi- 
nal trustees of the corporation, and the founder 
transferred to the company a percentage of his 
stock in his business, which was considerably more 
than one half of his holdings. The trustees ex- 
ecuted back to him a power of attorney to vote 
and control this stock during his lifetime. This 
steward of the Lord writes: 

"So many of us as soon as our business com- 
mences to pay big dividends, immediately set to 
work to find other investments in which to place 
the surplus funds. I believe when the Lord has 
enabled us to make a success of one line, that we 
should stop right there and give him all the sur- 
plus above our requirements for that business and 



Stewardship," by C. C. Cook, p. 51. 

130 



AND THE PROGRAM OF -JESUS 

for our families. I am sure tliat our lives would 
be lengthened and we could get much more satis- 
faction out of them if men would adopt this prin- 
ciple. 

"I have stopped entirely making any material 
investments. No amount of profit is equal, in my 
estimation, to the good one can do in these strenu- 
ous times for religious and altruistic work." 

Potential Givers now in the Sunday School. — 
Not every Sunday-school pupil will become a home 
or foreign missionary, but every one of them will 
acquire a certain income from patrimony, wages, 
business, trade or profession. It is the Sunday- 
school teacher's opportunity to impress upon each 
pupil the idea of stewardship, so that all funds and 
property will be handled not for personal aggran- 
dizement, but for the extension of God's kingdom. 
David Livingstone's attitude toward property 
should be inculcated, if the missionary enterprise 
is to be adequately supported from the home base. 
"I will place no value on anything I have or may 
possess except in relation to the kingdom of 
Christ." If every Sunday-school pupil adopts 
this attitude toward property, there will be no 
difficulty in financing the missionary enterprise 
at home or abroad in the days to come. Some 
of the pupils in the Sunday schools of to-day are 
going to be merchant princes, the magnates, the 
millionaries of to-morrow. Toward them as well 

131 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

as toward those who will control less wealth we 
have an immediate duty. They must be taught 
stewardship. 

The Sunday-School Teacher's Opportunity. — 
The Sunday-school teacher must needs be a seer, 
therefore, one who can discern in his pupils qual- 
ities that will make the future missionary or the 
future supporter of missions. Good health, good 
humor, ability to get on well with others, intel- 
ligence, high moral standards, perseverance, pa- 
tience, pluck — these are some of the qualities de- 
manded of the missionary whether at home or 
abroad. Some of your pupils doubtless have these 
traits. Can you picture them on the mission field 
some day because of the impulse you awakened 
in them to engage in such service ? 

Do you see in others of your pupils qualities 
which will make them successful in business, the 
trades or professions, and their abilities conse- 
crated absolutely to the extension of the kingdom? 

In proportion to the distinctness of our mis- 
sionary vision and the zeal with which we bend 
our energies toward the accomplishment of the 
missionary purpose of Jesus, our Sunday-school 
work will become genuinely vital and the boys 
and girls in our keeping will be led out into the 
rich full life which should be their heritage. 



132 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 



FOR DISCUSSION 

1 In the history of your Sunday school, how many pupils 
have become ministers of the gospel ? Home mission- 
aries'? Foreign missionaries? 

2. If living, where are they now located, and what contact 

has the school with them? 

3. How can such contact be • made more practically helpful 

to the school at present? 

4. What members of your present Sunday-school class do you 

think should become ministers or missionaries? 

5. Have now a brief season of prayer that God would call 

some to such spheres of service. Pray for the pupils 
by name. 

6. What evidence have any of the pupils in your class given 

that they have any interest in missions? Who have 
shown this interest? 

7. What can you do to strengthen it, beginning this week? 

8. What can you do to arouse a missionary interest in those 

members of your class who have shown no interest in 
missions ? 

9. What activities, based on the natural interests of your 

pupils, can you suggest that would arouse and quicken 
missionary zeal? 

10. Find out by personal interviews with each member of 

your class what plans they have for life work, and what 
are their ideas of stewardship. 

11. In the light of this discovery, where should you place 

emphasis in your teaching? 

12. In which of your pupils do you see response to your 

teaching expressed in actual practical life? 



133 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

The Missionary Call 

Candidates in Waiting. By Georgiana A. Gollock. Student 
Volunteer Movement. Cloth, 50 cents. 
A manual of home preparation for foreign missionary work. 

The Call, Qualifications and Preparation of Candidates 
for Missionary Service. Student Volunteer Move- 
ment. Pp. 248 ; paper, 35 cents ; cloth, 50 cents. 
Papers by missionaries and other authorities, such as 
Eobert E. Speer, Eugene Stock, Henry Jessup, and others. 

The Future Leadership of the Church. By John R. Mott. 
Student Volunteer Movement. Pp. 208; cloth, 50 
cents; library edition, gilt edge, $1.00. 
The object of this book is to aid in enlisting more of the 
ablest men for the ministry. 
What Constitutes a Missionary Call 1 ? By Robert E. 
Speer. Student Volunteer Movement. Pp. 31; 5 cents. 
A searching analysis of some objections to volunteering 
for foreign missions. 

Stewardship 

A Man and His Money. By Harvey Reeves Calkins. The 
Methodist Book Concern. Pp. 367; cloth, $1.00. 
A study of stewardship in its fundamental aspects. . . . 
A human document of deep and compelling interest. 

Over Against the Treasury. By Courtenay H. Fenn. West- 
minster Press. Pp. 100; board, 60 cents. 
A vision which brings home in a vivid way the responsi- 
bility of Christians for world-wide evangelization. It re- 
minds one of "What Would Jesus Do?" 
Stewardship and Missions. By Charles A. Cook. American 
Baptist Publication Society. Pp. 170; cloth, 50 cents; 
paper, 35 cents. 
Brief and very suggestive. 
With You Always. By Courtenay H. Fenn. Westminster 
Press. Pp. 238; board, 75 cents. 
A sequel to "Over Against the Treasury." 

134 



THE SUNDAY SCHOOL ORGANIZED 
FOE KINGDOM PROMOTION 



CHAPTER VI 

THE SUNDAY SCHOOL ORGANIZED FOR 
KINGDOM PROMOTION 

In the construction of a building it is necessary 
to have a plan, materials and workmen. So in 
the Sunday school the missionary essentials are 
a definite, clear-cut plan or policy; materials or 
equipment with which to work, and a missionary 
committee to make the policy effective by use of 
the materials. 

Any adequate missionary policy will provide 
not merely instruction, but training. Education 
is concerned with the broadening of the intellec- 
tual horizon, the culture of the emotions and the 
challenge of the will. It is possible for a pupil to 
have an intellectual grasp of the missionary situa- 
tion and remain unmoved. The Sunday-school 
teacher's task is a large one, therefore, than mere 
instruction in knowledge. He is concerned also 
with the education of the feelings and of the will. 
Action is influenced often more largely by the feel- 
ings than by the intellect, or as Professor St. John 
puts it, "We act in view of what we feel rather 
than of what we know. ' ' Education is incomplete 
without both impression and expression. In fact 
expression is a part of acquisition. We have not 

137 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

actually acquired or learned what we do not ex- 
press. 

The Sunday-school teacher is concerned, then, 
with these two phases of education, instruction 
and training. Let us see what the Sunday school 
may provide for missionary instruction and train- 
ing. 

MISSIONARY INSTRUCTION 

Missionary instruction may be given both dur- 
ing and outside of the Sunday-school session. Most 
Sunday-school workers to-day realize the need of 
more time for religious education, and efforts are 
being made to secure it by lengthened sessions on 
Sunday or by supplemental sessions during the 
week. The difficulty with such supplemental ses- 
sions is that only a portion of the school's mem- 
bership is reached. This is the case with mis- 
sionary instruction in various missionary organ- 
izations and bands. 

Let us see, however, what is possible during the 
Sunday-school session. There may be missionary 
atmosphere, platform instruction, class instruc- 
tion or a combination of any of these. 

Missionary Atmosphere. — Missionary atmos- 
phere should be constant in the school. It is cre- 
ated by the display upon the walls of pictures, 
maps, mottoes, charts, diagrams and like visible 
objects which require no time from the Sunday- 

138 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

school session, but which present their message to 
the eye. All but the pictures can be made locally 
or purchased. Photographs of famous mission- 
aries enlarged for framing and finished in sepia 
or black and white can be obtained at small cost. 
"When such pictures are secured an unveiling cere- 
mony will call attention to them and quicken in- 
terest. 

Platform Instruction. — Instruction adapted to 
the needs of the pupils may also be given from 
the platform in the various departments. This 
instruction will be varied. On special occasions, 
such as Easter, the Thanksgiving season and 
Rally Day, the entire session may be devoted to 
a missionary program. Many of the denomina- 
tional mission Boards supply such programs upon 
request. Some schools use a missionary program 
once a month, devoting to it the opening period 
of fifteen or twenty minutes. Such programs are 
frequently issued by the Missionary Education 
Movement. 60 Similar programs may be prepared 
by the Missionary Committee of the local Sunday 
school. 

Also from the platform, from week to week, as 
an integral part of the opening or closing periods, 
items of missionary interest may be used as in- 
troductory to Scripture, hymns or prayer, or as 

60 ' ' New Era Programs, ? ' 5 cents ; i l Services of Worship for 
the Sunday School, M based on the theme Brotherhood, 10 cents; 
"Missionary Programs and Incidents/' pp. 274, 50 cents. 

139 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

independent items. For example, one of the fol- 
lowing might be used: 

Some years ago when the evangelist George 
Barnes was conducting meetings in Kentucky, he 
visited an old mountain woman, and was telling 
her the story of the crucifixion of Jesus. She had 
never heard it before. She listened with great in- 
terest and inquired, "Did you say this happened 
a long while ago?" "Yes," said Mr. Barnes, 
"nearly nineteen hundred years ago." 

"Do you mean to say that they killed him, when 
he had come down on earth for nothin' but to save 
'em?" "Yes, they crucified him," was the reply. 

A tear was seen to trickle down the wrinkled 
cheek of the old woman, as she said, "Well, let's 
hope it ain't so." 

She did not know it was necessary for Jesus to 
die. She had never heard what the prophet Isaiah 
said of him, "It pleased the Lord to bruise him.'' 
So let us turn for our Scripture lesson to-day to 
the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah and let us read 
responsively verses 3-7, that tell about the suffer- 
ing Saviour. 61 

One day, in Central Africa, George Grenfell, the 
missionary, was on a boat approaching a village 
on the banks of one of the tributaries of the Congo 
Eiver. As he drew near, he noticed on the shore a 
number of young people assembled to welcome 
him. He heard the sounds of music floating out 
to him across the water, the strains of "All hail 
the power of Jesus' name," sung to the tune of 
Miles Lane. As he listened, and thought how these 
African young people had given up their heathen- 

61 i ' Five Missionary Minutes, ' ' and ' i Missionary Programs and 
Incidents, " by George H. Trull, each contain material of this 
nature. 

140 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

ism and were singing praises to the name of 
Christ, his soul was thrilled with joy, and he, too, 
broke out into singing, joining in their song. 

Let us sing that hymn to-day in our Sunday 
school and with the same spirit and feeling we 
would have put into it, if we had been out there 
with George Grenfell in the heart of Africa. 62 

The following illustrates a method of utilizing 
current events: 

Many of you have doubtless noticed in the news- 
papers during the past week accounts of the bom- 
bardment 63 of the Turkish forts in the Darda- 
nelles by the allied French and English fleets. 
This is causing fears of a massacre of foreigners 
in Constantinople by the Moslem population. In 
Constantinople there are a number of American 
missionaries. Robert College and the American 
School for Girls, both of them missionary institu- 
tions, are also located there. We can help these 
missionaries and the native Christians just now 
by prayer. Shall we do it? Let us all bow our 
heads, and pray silently that, if it be God's will, 
a massacre may be averted and that the mission- 
ary property may be preserved from destruction. 
Will Mr. then voice our united petitions ? 

Class Instruction. — In addition to the platform 
instruction, the teacher in his class work will find 
abundant opportunity for missionary education. 
An intimate knowledge of the pupil's environ- 
ment and interests is essential if missionary in- 
struction and training are to be vital. Through 



02 ' ' Five Missionary Minutes, ? ' and 1 1 Missionary Programs and In- 
cidents/ ' by George H. Trull, each contain material of this nature. 

63 This Prayer introduction was used appropriately on Sunday, 
March 15, 1915. 

141 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

the newspaper and the public school the pupil ? s 
fund of knowledge rapidly increases. The Sun- 
day-school teacher may to some extent correlate 
his missionary teaching with the work in the public 
school. "When could there be a better time to use 
in the Sunday school the stories of Marcus Whit- 
man and Jason Lee, as told in "Winning the 
Oregon Country," 64 than when the history class 
in the public school is studying the development 
of the great Northwest? When the geography 
class is studying Africa, "Uganda's White Man 
of Work" 65 and "Livingstone the Pathfinder," 66 
should be often in the Sunday-school teacher's 
hands. Equally appropriate times arise for the 
presentation of missionary material concerning 
China, India, Alaska, Porto Eico, the American 
Indians and other phases of our home and for- 
eign mission problems. 

The teacher with missionary outlook will also 
use missionary illustrations whenever they are 
appropriate, drawing them from missionary biog- 
raphy, history and also from current events. He 
will make clear that missions are a living reality 
now in process. He will discuss present-day 
needs and opportunities. He will interpret in 
terms of the kingdom political events that have 



By John T. Faris. 

By Sophia Lyon Fahs ; Biography of Alexander Mackay. 
By Basil Mathews. 

142 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

any bearing upon the missionary enterprise. This 
he will do with an imagination and sympathy that 
will enable him to appreciate the significance of 
the facts. 

The teacher should also present to the pupil the 
facts that will enable him to judge the relative 
needs in the various departments of the kingdom 
work. Sunday-school pupils should become fa- 
miliar with the various Church Boards, their func- 
tions, their policies and their needs. These must 
be presented to pupils, if they are in any intelli- 
gent way to assume responsibility for the larger 
work of the Church in the future. To this end 
literature should be secured from the mission 
Boards from time to time and used with discrimi- 
nation among the pupils. Correspondence with 
the mission Boards on the part of pupils and 
teachers should be encouraged. Names of pupils 
who are planning to become home or foreign mis- 
sionaries or who are seriously considering the 
question should be forwarded to the appropriate 
mission Board. Pupils should become familiar 
with the names and duties of the various mission 
Board secretaries of their denomination, and with 
the achievements of prominent denominational 
missionaries. The habit of contributing to the 
work of the denomination done through these 
Boards should also be established. The pupils 
should be made to understand that the organized 
missionary work of the Church is carried on by 

143 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

a great living, throbbing human organism of 
which they form a part, and not by a machine 
which operates independently of the allegiance of 
its individual constituents. 

The Sunday-school curriculum should not neg- 
lect the historical background of modern mis- 
sions, but should give a constructive presentation 
of the progress of the kingdom since New Testa- 
ment times. Boys and girls should understand 
the missionary journeys of Paul and other 
missionaries of New Testament times. Since 
Paul's day thousands of important missionary 
journeys have been made, and with some of these 
the pupil should become familiar. Then, too, the 
line of the great missionary apostles did not end 
with Paul, and Sunday-school pupils should have 
an opportunity to become acquainted with the 
great outstanding missionary characters of the 
Church. Robert Morrison, William Carey, Ado- 
niram Judson, Ann Haseltine Judson, Robert 
Moffatt, David Livingstone, John Eliot, Marcus 
Whitman, Jason Lee, Bishop Whipple, Sheldon 
Jackson, these and others should become familiar 
figures to our Sunday-school pupils. How can 
they understand the present program of the 
Church if they do not know of the struggle, pain 
and sacrifice of these heroes of the past? 

Outside the Sunday-School Session. — Missionary 
instruction may also be given outside the regu- 

144 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

lar session of the Sunday school. It may be 
through the general reading of missionary litera- 
ture such as books, magazines, or leaflets, to which 
the pupil has access. Whether or not a pupil will 
read a book or magazine, often depends as much 
upon the way it is presented to him as upon the 
publication itself. The teacher's statement that 
the book is one which the pupil ought to read may 
be just the thing which will turn him against it. 
There is nothing quite like a story from the book 
itself to arouse attention. If this is inherently in- 
teresting, the pupil will, in most cases, read the* 
book without further suggestions. Missionary in- 
struction may be given also through the prepara- 
tion of some assignment from the teacher; some 
topic to investigate. 

Similar instruction may be given through mis- 
sion study in the class as a whole, meeting at a time 
other than during the Sunday-school hour. Mis- 
sionary instruction may also be given to an or- 
ganized class in the Sunday school or to a mission 
band or some other organization with which the 
Sunday-school pupils may be affiliated. Program 
meetings may be held of various kinds such as 
stereopticon lectures, dramatic entertainments, 
pageants or impersonations. Missionary games 
might also be used, such as "Who's Who in Mis- 
sions," 67 which is similar to the well-known game 
of authors. 



Published by The Sunday School Times Co. Price, 50 cents. 

145 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 



MISSIONARY TRAINING 

So far we have considered missionary instruc- 
tion. Education is incomplete, however, with 
mere instruction. It must also train the feelings 
and challenge the will. Missionary education, 
to make its highest contribution to character de- 
velopment, must provide opportunity for interest 
to find expression in such practical ways as inter- 
cession, giving and service. 

Training in Intercession. — The great need of the 
hour is the practice of prayer. The Sunday-- 
school pupil cannot be trained in prayer unless 
he actually prays. The scope of his prayer life will 
be greatly broadened as he learns of the needs of 
others. It will be relieved of the formality and 
monotony characteristic of self -centered prayers. 

"We must make it natural for the Sunday-school 
pupil to pray when he learns of conditions of 
need. One effective method is to hold brief sea- 
sons of silent prayer for specific needs stated by 
the superintendent. These seasons should ordi- 
narily last not-more than fifteen seconds, and then 
some one should be called on to voice audibly the 
concerted petitions. Another method is to fol- 
low for any month the topics suggested in the 
denominational prayer cycles, home and foreign. 
Some information about these topics should be 

146 



AND THE PROGRAM OF' JESUS 

given so that the prayer may be definite and not 
too general. "Lord bless China" is compre- 
hensive, but it is more specific to pray, "0 Lord 
we thank thee for the changed attitude in China 
toward the gospel, for the open minds of the offi- 
cials, their readiness to investigate the claims of 
Christ upon their lives. We pray that the gov- 
ernment students now enrolled in Bible classes 
may through the study of this Book be led to 
Christ, and that they may propagate throughout 
the land Christian ideals and principles. In the 
name of Christ we ask it. Amen." 

The school should be informed of answers to 
prayer in general on the mission field, and of an- 
swers to their prayers. Through experience in 
prayer they must learn that intercession releases 
great spiritual forces and energies. 

Training in Giving. — The objects toward which 
one's sympathies go out, and the objects for 
which he prays are the ones to which he will de- 
sire to give. Giving is an art. It is also a grace. 
It can be developed, however, only by practice. 
The amount of money which the Sunday-school 
pupil is able to give is secondary as compared 
with the good which comes to him through giv- 
ing. A speaker at a missionary meeting once re- 
marked that the American people, as a rule, have 
their benevolent impulses under perfect control. 
In fact, they are under such control that many 

147 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

adult Christians are in no way stirred by the ap- 
palling needs at home and abroad. 

There are two great claims that the Sunday- 
school pupil should be taught to recognize in his 
giving, local support and benevolences. By local 
support we mean support of the church in its en- 
tirety rather than the support of the Sunday school 
as separate and distinct. In that case the support 
of the Sunday school should be included in the 
budget of the church. The Sunday schools that 
take a monthly offering for benevolences are 
training the pupils, perhaps unconsciously, in the 
conception that the benevolent offerings are only 
one fourth as important as is local support. 
Schools which raise their benevolences solely by 
occasional special offerings train the pupil in the 
idea that benevolences are only an occasional de- 
mand. The result is that many church members 
to-day disclaim any obligation to benevolences 
or missions and do not give to them. Where du- 
plex envelopes have been introduced in the 
churches, seldom is it found that there are as 
many contributors to the benevolences as to the 
church support. 

The writer one day observed the checking up 
of the gifts in the benevolent side of the duplex 
envelopes in a prominent church of over one thou- 
sand members in central New York. Many of 
the envelopes were empty, and on inquiring he 
was told that about one third of the membership 

148 



AND THE PROGRAM OF. JESUS 

of this church did not contribute to the benev- 
olences. 

There are some who hold the view that con- 
tributing to church support can hardly be termed 
giving, because one secures full value in sermons 
and ministrations by the pastor and church for 
all that is paid in. The church is really an asset 
in the community and helps real estate values. 
You would not care to live in a town in which there 
was no church. It renders a distinct service to 
every member of the community, and to contribute 
to its support is simply to pay for benefits re- 
ceived. If I go into a grocery store and get a bag 
of flour or a package of sugar in return for money 
I hand the grocer, I do not consider that I have 
made him a gift. He has given me full value for 
my money. Likewise the church gives full value 
for all its members contribute to it, and so does 
the Sunday school. Hence the need of training 
the Sunday-school pupil to a sense of obligation 
to others, to the support of missions at home and 
abroad. It is through such giving that character 
is really developed and strengthened. 

The value of the specific object should be men- 
tioned. Giving as well as prayer should be 
definite. There are graded interests, hence graded 
objects of giving should be provided. These are 
all met in the * ' Station Plan. ' ' The local Sunday 
school on consultation with the mission Board 
has assigned to it a share to the extent of its an- 

149 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

nual gift in some particular station of its own 
preference. A station is chosen in which there 
are kinds of work that will appeal to all ages in 
the Sunday school, from children to adults. Let- 
ters are sent from the field several times each 
year telling about the work and what are the re- 
sults of the school's investment. Letters from 
the school are also sent to the mission station, and 
thus close touch is established between the local 
school and the mission field, the interest is quick- 
ened and the sense of responsibility for the mis- 
sion work is strengthened. 

Training in Service. — The Christian life is one 
of service. Such service is more than mere 
activity; it is a service which is actuated by the 
relation which the Christian sustains to God and 
to his fellow men. Missionary service, if vital, 
must of necessity grow out of a life which has in 
some way identified itself with the needs of others. 
The carrying of a dinner to a poor family may be 
an unwise expression of the desire to serve, unless 
in some way those who expend this bounty really 
sympathize with the life and interests of those 
who are served. At no point is there need for 
greater skill in religious education than in organ- 
izing the service activities of the pupils. It is 
one of the tasks, however, which must be under- 
taken. 

Many missionary activities are possible in the 

150 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

sphere in which the pupil lives, the home, the 
school, the office, the shop or factory, the com- 
munity, and the world at large. 

Oftentimes the spirit of the act will determine 
its character as much as the act itself. Every- 
thing which makes for kindness, unselfishness, 
self-sacrifice, generosity, fidelity, moral courage 
and other like qualities tends to develop the mis- 
sionary spirit even though the act may not be tech- 
nically missionary. 

Juniors and Intermediates may bring new pu- 
pils into Sunday school. The younger children 
may make scrapbooks and collect appropriate post 
cards which may be used in hospitals, schools and 
homes on the mission field. The older children 
may dress dolls, knit mittens, make simple gar- 
ments. They may also carry flowers and delicacies 
to the sick and aged, and engage in helpful activi- 
ties in the local community. "Missionary Work 
Parties for Boys and Girls, " published by the 
United Free Church of Scotland, 68 indicates nu- 
merous things that may be done to help the mis- 
sionary cause. In country districts young people 
may raise produce, poultry, and eggs, and invest 
the proceeds in missionary work at home and 
abroad. This has the advantage of requiring pro- 
longed attention and care on the part of the pupils, 
and thus sustains their interest for a continued 
period. 

68 Address, 121 George Street, Edinburgh. Price, Fourpence. 

151 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

Seniors and older pupils may teach in mission 
schools, or teach English to foreigners. All may 
give a welcome to newcomers in the church and 
community. Social life under Christian environ- 
ment may be provided for those who lack social 
opportunities. 

The object of such training in actual service is 
to produce young people who will take their places 
in the world's work to promote the kingdom. 
Some of them will doubtless enter the ministry or 
some other sphere of Christian work which de- 
mands their full time. The Sunday school that 
has as its objective the training and sending forth 
of missionary workers will get them. The teach- 
ers at their regular or at special meetings should 
make this object the subject of discussion and of 
special prayer. The curriculum should be planned 
with this in view, and emphasis should be laid 
upon such vocational work by pastor and super- 
intendent from the platform. 

Some schools have upon their walls the pic- 
tures of the missionaries that have gone out from 
the school. It is well in such a frame to leave a 
few vacant spaces for the pictures of those yet 
to go. 

Missionary Teacher Training. — Much attention 
is being given to the necessity of teacher training 
in the Sunday school. One of the subjects that 
has not as yet received adequate attention in most 

152 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

of the teacher-training courses is education in 
missions. A teacher cannot impart what he does 
not himself possess. If he has no missionary out- 
look and outreach, the pupils under him will be 
like him. If, however, he is intelligent on mis- 
sions, he can enrich his teaching in a remarkable 
manner and inspire in his pupils a growing inter- 
est in the enterprise. 

No methods of instruction or of training will, 
however, make up for the teacher who does not 
really feel concerned about the missionary pro- 
gram of the church. Missionary interest and en- 
thusiasm are contagious and a mere formal pres- 
entation of facts and a performance of certain 
acts will never atone for an indifferent attitude 
on the part of the teacher. 

It is essential, therefore, that each Sunday 
school should make definite arrangements for 
missionary teacher training. Every teacher who 
takes up work in the Sunday school should have at 
least a broad general knowledge of the mission 
field, should be acquainted with the missionary 
message of the Bible and should himself be thor- 
oughly concerned about the extension of the king- 
dom of God throughout the world. 

The Missionary Committee in the Sunday 
School. — If all Sunday-school teachers were thor- 
oughly intelligent concerning the missionary en- 
terprise, and if they were generally determined 

153 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

to make the most of their opportunities to direct 
the lives of their pupils toward the task of ex- 
tending the kingdom of Christ, there would be 
probably no need for additional organization to 
care for the work of missionary education. In 
few schools, however, is this the situation. It is 
necessary, therefore, in most schools to place upon 
certain individuals the responsibility for organ- 
izing and promoting missionary education in the 
Sunday school — namely, a Missionary Committee. 

Ordinarily the committee should be composed 
of representatives from the various departments. 
The members should be appointed for varying 
terms of six, twelve and eighteen months respec- 
tively. By this method there are retained on the 
committee members of experience, and others are 
introduced into the committee who bring new 
ideas and points of view even if they lack experi- 
ence. The changing of the personnel of the com- 
mittee every six months prevents getting into ruts ; 
more members of the school become trained in 
missionary work, and if one or two leaders are 
removed there are others trained to take their 
places and the work does not suffer. 

The Missionary Committee in the Sunday school 
should be represented on the Church United Com- 
mittee or Church Missionary Committee. This lat- 
ter relationship insures the coordination of the 
Sunday-school missionary activities with the mis- 
sionary work of the other departments of the 

154 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 

church. The pastor and superintendent of the 
Sunday school are members ex officio of the Sun- 
day-school Missionary Committee. 

It is the responsibility of the Missionary Com- 
mittee to plan the graded missionary education 
for the entire school and submit it for approval 
to the officers and teachers. The educational work 
itself will be done largely by the superintendent 
and by the teachers in the classes. The commit- 
tee should be ready to render any help that may 
be needed. 

Missionary Material or Equipment. — In the con- 
struction of a building we have considered two 
of the essential factors, the plan and the work- 
men. The third is the material or equipment. We 
have long since recognized the necessity of equip- 
ment in secular education. A like need is being 
recognized in religious education. The workman 
is helpless without tools, so is the Missionary 
Committee in the Sunday school. 

The appointment of a Missionary Committee in 
a local Sunday school should carry with it a suit- 
able appropriation for their work. The sum need 
not be large, but if granted annually a very com- 
plete equipment can gradually be secured. The 
committee should study carefully the needs of the 
local situation before expending its funds. Hav- 
ing decided what those needs are the necessary 
purchases should be made. The missionary equip- 

155 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

ment of a Sunday school should be an evolution, 
gradually secured, in accordance with specific 
needs. We would make here only some very gen- 
eral suggestions. Advice as to particular needs 
should be secured from the denominational mis- 
sion Boards. 

Material for the Missionary Committee. — In 
order to do its work efficiently the committee 
should purchase a book dealing with missionary 
methods. They should also have the latest vol- 
umes that deal with existing missionary situations 
at home and abroad. Titles of such books should 
be secured from the denominational mission 
Boards. 

The committee should have access to its own 
denominational missionary magazines and also to 
"The Missionary Review of the "World," a 
monthly; and " Everyland, ' ' a quarterly for young 
people, containing choice missionary stories and 
information. 

Material for the School as a Whole. — A bulle- 
tin board on which may be posted pictures, pos- 
ters and items of missionary interest is needed. 
Also the following: a well-selected missionary li- 
brary of books suitable for readers of different 
ages; a missionary map of the world; pictures 
of a few selected missionaries, suitably framed; 
a missionary curio cabinet. 

156 



AND THE PEOGEAM OF JESUS 

To the above there may be added from time to 
time such other things as necessity may demand. 
Catalogues of missionary supplies, adapted to the 
needs of the various departments of the school, 
may be secured from the denominational mission 
Boards and from the Missionary Education Move- 
ment, 156 Fifth Avenue, New York City. 

Missions in the Sunday School Indispensable. — 
The Sunday school will accomplish its highest 
purpose only as Sunday-school teachers and work- 
ers recognize the essentially missionary char- 
acter of their work. Working in an institution 
the purpose of which is to produce men and 
women of missionary passion, making use of a 
textbook the message of which is missionary, and 
dealing with boys and girls whose spiritual life 
demands the missionary expression, the work of 
Sunday-school teachers can be successful only in 
the measure in which it is filled with the mission- 
ary spirit and content. 



157 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 



FOR DISCUSSION 

1. What distinction would you make between instruction and 

training in missionary education? 

2. What methods of missionary instruction would you sug- 

gest to a Sunday school that had no knowledge of mis- 
sions and no interest in the subject? 

3. What phase of missionary training do you consider the 

most effective in the promotion of the spiritual life of 
the pupil and why? 

4. How is missionary giving related to character develop- 

ment? 

5. Why is a missionary committee in the Sunday school pref- 

erable to a missionary superintendent or director? 

6. Outline plans for missionary education in each department 

of your local school for the ensuing year. 
What factors must determine such an outline? 

7. What equipment has your Sunday school for missionary 

education at the present time? 

8. How can it be most effectively used in the various depart- 

ments of the school? 

9. What additional material would you suggest in view of 

the program of missionary education for the ensuing 
year you have outlined? 



158 



AND THE PROGRAM OF JESUS 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

A Part of the World Program. By Elizabeth D. Paxton. 
Missionary Education Movement (1914). Pp. 65; 
paper, 20 cents postpaid. 
A manual for use of the superintendent of missionary 
education of the County Sunday School Association. 

Boys' Congress of Missions. By Emma Emilie Koehler. 
Westminster Press (1907). Illustrated; pp. 183; cloth, 
50 cents. 
Tested plans for a boys' missionary organization. 

Children at Play in Many Lands. By Katherine S. Hall. 
Missionary Education Movement (1912). Pp. 92; cloth, 
75 cents postpaid. 
The book describes typical games of children in mission 
lands. It is profusely illustrated. 

Five Missionary Minutes. By George H. Trull. Mission- 
ary Education Movement (1912). Pp. 122; cloth, 50 
cents postpaid. 
Brief missionary material, home and foreign, for plat- 
form use in the Sunday school, for fifty-two Sundays. 

Holding the Ropes. By Belle M. Brain. Funk & Wagnalls 
(1908). Pp. 224; cloth, $1.00; postage extra. 
A valuable book of missionary methods for the various 
organizations of the church. 

Home Mission Handicraft. By A. and L. B. Beard. Scrib- 
ner's Sons (1909). Pp. 140; cloth, 60 cents; paper, 
35 cents. 
Practical ideas for work and play in Bands and Junior 
Societies. 

How to Get Missionary Books Read. (Free.) Mission- 
ary Education Movement. Pp. 8; paper. 
A brief pamphlet giving explicit instructions on how to 
secure readers for missionary books. Excellent for librarians 
and Sunday-school workers. 

Leaders in Conference. By Katharine R. Crowell. Woman's 
Board of Home Missions (1907). Illustrated; paper, 
30 cents. 
Some of the topics discussed are: Missions in the Sunday 
School, What to Do Sunday Afternoons, Practical Work, 
Constructive Work, Helps and Where to Get Them, Giv- 
ing, Leaders' Interchange, Games. 

159 



THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL TEACHER 

Missionary Education in the Sunday School. By Ralph 
E. Diffendorfer. Missionary Education Movement. Pp. 
43; paper, 10 cents. 
Describes the general organization of the Missionary Com- 
mittee and methods of missionary education in the Sunday 
school. 

Missionary Helps for Junior Leaders. By Margaret T. 
Applegarth and Nellie Prescott. Central Committee 
on United Study of Foreign Missions. Pp. 96; paper, 
25 cents; postage 4 cents. 
It is full of plans, programs, sketches of posters, and new- 
ideas for meetings which have been successfully worked out 
in practical experience. 

Missionary Methods for Sunday School Workers. By 

George H. Trull. Missionary Education Movement 

(1910). Pp. 267; cloth, 50 cents. 

An illustrated manual of methods containing, in addition, 

many charts, diagrams and a valuable list of missionary 

books for all ages. 

Missionary Programs and Incidents. By George H. Trull. 
Missionary Education Movement (1914). Pp. 275; 
cloth, 50 cents postpaid. 
This book contains sufficient material for a year. Mis- 
sionary items for platform use, and twelve complete pro- 
grams which can be used monthly. 

Missionary Work-Parties for Boys and Girls. United 
Free Church of Scotland. 121 George Street, Edin- 
burgh. Pp. 48; paper, fourpence. 
Indicates articles that may be sent to mission fields and 
how to make them. Also describes methods of work for sales 
at home. Very valuable pamphlet. 

Missions in the Sunday School. By Martha B. Hixson. 
Missionary Education Movement. Illustrated; pp. 215; 
cloth, 60 cents, 
A valuable book of methods. 

The Call of the World. By W. E. Doughty. Missionary 
Education Movement (1912). Pp. Ill; cloth, 25 cents. 
This book is especially useful for groups of Sunday- 
school workers desiring a broad outlook on the world field. 

The Way We Did It. By J. Gertrude Hutton. Missionary 
Education Movement (1914). Pp. 16; paper, 5 cents. 
An illustrated leaflet describing the development of mis- 
sionary education in one school. Shows how to use literature 
boxes and posters successfully. 

160 



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